English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News &
Editorials
For November 15/2026
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
#elias_bejjani_news
The Bulletin's Link on the lccc Site
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/aaaanewsfor2026/english.november15.26.htm
News Bulletin Achieves Since 2006
Click Here to enter the LCCC Arabic/English news bulletins Achieves since 2006
Click On The Below Link To Join Elias Bejjaninews whatsapp group
https://chat.whatsapp.com/FPF0N7lE5S484LNaSm0MjW
اضغط على الرابط في أعلى للإنضمام لكروب Eliasbejjaninews whatsapp group
Elias Bejjani/Click on the below link to subscribe to my youtube channel
الياس بجاني/اضغط على الرابط في أسفل للإشتراك في موقعي ع اليوتيوب
https://www.youtube.com/@eliasbejjani8036
Bible Quotations For today
Verses telling the Story of Zechariah the Priest & His Wife Elizabeth, John the
Papist’s Parents
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint
Luke01/01-25/:”Since many have undertaken to set down an orderly account of the
events that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed on to us by
those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, I too
decided, after investigating everything carefully from the very first, to write
an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the
truth concerning the things about which you have been instructed. In the days of
King Herod of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the
priestly order of Abijah. His wife was a descendant of Aaron, and her name was
Elizabeth. Both of them were righteous before God, living blamelessly according
to all the commandments and regulations of the Lord. But they had no children,
because Elizabeth was barren, and both were getting on in years. Once when he
was serving as priest before God and his section was on duty, he was chosen by
lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to enter the sanctuary of the
Lord and offer incense. Now at the time of the incense-offering, the whole
assembly of the people was praying outside. Then there appeared to him an angel
of the Lord, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah
saw him, he was terrified; and fear overwhelmed him. But the angel said to him,
‘Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife
Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John. You will have joy and
gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the sight
of the Lord. He must never drink wine or strong drink; even before his birth he
will be filled with the Holy Spirit. He will turn many of the people of Israel
to the Lord their God. With the spirit and power of Elijah he will go before
him, to turn the hearts of parents to their children, and the disobedient to the
wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.’Zechariah
said to the angel, ‘How will I know that this is so? For I am an old man, and my
wife is getting on in years.’The angel replied, ‘I am Gabriel. I stand in the
presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good
news. But now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in
their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things
occur.’ Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah, and wondered at his
delay in the sanctuary. When he did come out, he could not speak to them, and
they realized that he had seen a vision in the sanctuary. He kept motioning to
them and remained unable to speak. When his time of service was ended, he went
to his home. After those days his wife Elizabeth conceived, and for five months
she remained in seclusion. She said, ‘This is what the Lord has done for me when
he looked favourably on me and took away the disgrace I have endured among my
people.’”
Titles For The English LCCC Lebanese &
Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on November
14-15/2026
The Danger of the Iranian Mullahs Possessing a Nuclear Bomb: Hitler’s
Lesson That Was Never Understood/Elias Bejjani/November 14/ 2026
Hopefully USA & Israel will attack Iran & topple its satanic regime/Elias
Bejjani/November 12/2026
To Our Official, Partisan, Political Maronite Leaders and Clergymen: Who Is Your
Role Model, the Traitor Muqaddam Salem or the Martyr Patriarch Daniel Al-Hadchiti?/With
an article by Colonel Charbel Barakat recounting the story of Muqaddam
Salem/Elias Bejjani/November 12/2026
Holy Lebanon in the Grip of Corruption and Occupation and the Heresies of Satan
Berri's Calls for Dialogue/Elias Bejjani/November 10/2026
Report: Hezbollah detainees say were surveilling northern area to protect Shiite
towns from attack
IMF says more work needed on Lebanon reforms
Army seizes arms depot in Beirut southern suburbs
Bitar interrogates army member as new defendant in port case
Judicial Developments in the Case of the Five Detainees from Hezbollah: Here Are
the Details
The "Sinai Model" at the Gates of Southern Lebanon? The Backstage of the US Plan
to Replace UNIFIL and Bypass the Security Council Veto
The Post-UNIFIL Era on the Table of the Three Presidents: What Agenda Is U.S.
Envoy Michael Waltz Carrying on His Fact-Finding Visit to Beirut?
After Trump Sidelined Vance... Will Some Domestic Factions Remain Clinging to
the Islamabad Track?
Post-UNIFIL on the Table of the Three Presidents... Aoun: A Comprehensive
Approach to the Monopoly of Weapons, and Geagea: The State is Belittling Itself
Hezbollah: No End to the Resistance and Weapons, Not Even After a Hundred Years
Resolution 1701 is the Primary Reference... President Aoun Affirms to UN Deputy
Secretary-General that Priority is for the Continuation of "UNIFIL" or Finding
an Alternative Mechanism Under the UN Umbrella
Salam Discusses Future of UNIFIL with UN Official... Lebanon Rejects Any
International Vacuum in the South
Massive Fire in a Displaced Persons Camp in Zahlé District: 30 Tents and a Car
Engulfed in Flames
Following the Circulation of the "Honor" Narrative in the Al-Alwani Case,
General Security Responds
Bilal Erdogan from Tripoli: We need Lebanon to be united internally
Lebanon’s president reassures Christians as they remain under pressure/Romy
Haber/EWTN News/November 14/2026
Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous
Reports And News published on November
14-15/2026
Trump, Xi, Putin to hold historic meeting in
China
Netanyahu Calls on Eisenkot to Join a
“National Unity Government” to Eliminate the “Iranian Threat”
Your tricks don't fool me".. Eisenkot attacks Netanyahu and rejects his call for
a unity government
Israeli army says it targeted a senior commander in Hamas's military wing...
Killing of Samir Abu Younis, commander of the "Rafah Brigade"
Eisenkot: Netanyahu calls for unity while practicing incitement and division /
Eisenkot in response to Netanyahu: His call for negotiations is just a political
maneuver
After the Iran War.. Israeli Fears of an Uncalculated Surprise
The Three Scenarios on the Israeli Army's Table and the Missile Arms Race
18 Arab and Islamic Countries Escalate Their Stance Against Israel.. Warnings of
Ceasefire Collapse and Calls to Open Gaza Crossings
Raiding 20 Homes and Carving a Military Path Toward the Yarmouk Basin..
Continued Israeli Field Escalation in Southern Syria and Detention of 49
Civilians
Trump Between Riyadh and Ankara Pressures and Israeli Threats.. Will Escalation
with Iran Be Avoided?
Iranian Plot to Target the US President?
After the Iran War.. Israeli Fears of an Uncalculated Surprise
Thousands of US Flights Canceled and Delayed Despite Resumption of Travel...
Operations Expected to Return Largely to Normal by End of Sunday
US Embassy Warns of Escalation in Saudi Arabia.. Houthis and Iran in the Circle
of Concern
US Transportation Secretary Reveals Cause of Technical Malfunction and Warns
US air travel resumption will 'take time' after hours-long stop
After Widespread Paralysis in US Airports... When Will Flight Chaos End?
Between Military Moves and Energy Security.. New US-Iranian Escalation and
Strait of Hormuz in the Forefront
Blinken Warns of Catastrophic Military Option Against Iran... What Would Fully
Destroying Its Capabilities Require?
Iranian Navy: Three Tankers Caught Fire After Hitting Naval Mines in Strait of
Hormuz
Oil Smuggling File in Jurf al-Nasr, Iraq Explodes.. Al-Zaidi Refers Those
Involved to Judiciary and Dismisses Security Leaders
Explosive Device Blast Shakes Jaramana in Damascus Countryside.. Here Are the
Details
French Police Detain More Than 200 People During Saturday Protests ... Situation
Remained Generally Under Control
Titles For The Latest English LCCC
analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published
on November
14-15/2026
The Gulf Is a Partner in the Settlement/Mohammed al-Rumaihi/Asharq Al-Awsat/November
14/2026
The Crisis of Modern Man… When Instinct Prevails Over Values/Mustafa al-Kadhimi-Former
Iraqi Prime Minister/Asharq Al-Awsat/November 14/2026
Syria’s Support to Yemen and Saudi Arabia/Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al-Awsat/November
14/2026
The US Elections… A Test of Cognitive Immunity/Dr. Abdullah Faisal Alrabeh/Asharq
Al-Awsat/November 14/2026
Spinning in the Same Circle... No Serious Breakthrough on the Moscow-Kyiv
Track/Laura Yammine/Al-Markazia/November 14, 2026
What is the Future of Islamist Movements in the Arab World?/Dr. Abdullah Juma
Al-Hajj/ Al-Ittihad/November 14, 2026
Washington and Iran: Diplomacy Under Siege/Hoda Raouf/Independent Arabia/
November 14, 2026
Selected Face Book & X tweets on November 14/2026
Latest English LCCC Lebanese &
Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on November
14-15/2026
(Some of the News reports below are
translated from Arabic by AI)
The Danger of the Iranian Mullahs Possessing
a Nuclear Bomb: Hitler’s Lesson That Was Never Understood
Elias Bejjani/November 14/ 2026
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2026/11/159003/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORcz3Yg23jY&t=56s
Allowing the current Iranian regime to possess a nuclear weapon is not merely a
strategic error; it is a catastrophic gamble with the security of the entire
international order. This regime is not like ordinary states that seek
deterrence or balance. It is a system built on a religious-political doctrine
that views global chaos as the path to “salvation,” war as a sacred means, and
human beings as cheap fuel.
Ideological Roots: Delusions Managed as State Policy
The belief system that governs Tehran today is not merely a political ideology.
It is a mixture of delusions, hallucinations, and detachment from reality.
According to the doctrine of Wilayat al-Faqih established by Khomeini after
1979, “true peace” can only be achieved with the return of the “Hidden Imam”
(the Mahdi) from his occultation. For that to happen, the ground must first be
prepared through chaos, wars, and global turmoil. This is not marginal rhetoric;
it is an integral part of the regime’s political and religious literature.
Khomeini himself wrote in his books and letters about the necessity of exporting
the revolution and about political borders being temporary illusions in the face
of the “Islamic ummah” that must submit to the rule of the jurist.
In their view, the entire world is not a collection of sovereign states with
borders, but open arenas for their struggle. When they lose one arena, they move
to another: from Lebanon to Syria, from Iraq to Yemen, from Gaza to the Red Sea.
This pattern has been clear since the 1980s: the creation of Hezbollah in
Lebanon, support for the Houthis in Yemen, the arming of militias in Iraq and
Syria, and the financing of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Whenever one front narrows,
another is opened. Borders, to them, are imaginary lines, and states are merely
tools or temporary obstacles
There is no real value for human life in this system. The concept of “martyrdom”
has been widely promoted since the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988), when tens of
thousands of young men and boys were sent in human-wave assaults against mines
and tanks, promised paradise and the houris. This discourse continued after the
war and became a permanent tool of mobilization. A regime that holds such a
belief does not fear human losses the way modern, democratic, and free states
do. Martyrdom is not a tragedy; it is a ticket to paradise. This renders
traditional deterrence calculations weakly effective against a system that sees
mass death as a path to ideological victory.
The Historical Parallel with Hitler: A Lesson Never Absorbed
In its essence and mechanisms, this situation resembles that of Nazi Germany in
the 1930s. After Hitler came to power in 1933, he rearmed first secretly and
then openly, violated the Treaty of Versailles, remilitarized the Rhineland in
1936, annexed Austria in 1938, and then demanded the Sudetenland in
Czechoslovakia. At the Munich Conference in September 1938, British Prime
Minister Neville Chamberlain and French Premier Édouard Daladier made major
concessions, believing that “peace in our time” was possible by containing
Hitler through dialogue and concessions. That conviction was a catastrophic
historical error. Instead of containing him, they gave him time, legitimacy, and
the ability to rearm, until it was he who imposed war in 1939 by invading
Poland, then overran Europe and killed millions before his regime was brought
down in 1945.
The parallel is not superficial. Both regimes built an ideology that sees the
world as an arena of inevitable conflict, used propaganda and mass mobilization
to glorify sacrifice and death, repeatedly violated international agreements
without initially paying a real price, and benefited from the hesitation of the
major powers and their fear of early confrontation.
The Nuclear Record and Negotiations: A Consistent Pattern of Deception
Since the late 1980s and early 1990s, Iran’s nuclear program has followed a
secretive path. In 2002, the Iranian opposition revealed the Natanz and Arak
facilities, prompting investigations by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Over two decades, recurring patterns emerged: concealment of facilities, delays
in reporting, enrichment beyond declared limits, and research activities with
military dimensions. The 2015 JCPOA granted Iran sanctions relief in exchange
for temporary restrictions. After the American withdrawal from the agreement,
Tehran accelerated enrichment, reaching levels close to military use in later
stages, while reducing cooperation with inspectors. This is not the behavior of
a state seeking only legitimate deterrence. It is the behavior of a regime that
uses negotiations as a tool to buy time and resources—exactly as Hitler used
diplomatic conferences before the war.
The Consequences of Western and Israeli Policies: The Price of Hesitation and
the Return to the Logic of Concessions
There is another highly dangerous dimension directly linked to the Iranian
regime’s ability to recover and rebuild its influence. When American policy
shifts from a approach of maximum pressure, severe sanctions, and clear military
deterrence to one that relies primarily on agreements, concessions, and open
dialogue, the Iranian regime regains a wide margin for maneuver. This shift does
not occur in a vacuum; it directly affects American military capabilities in the
region, the readiness of allies to act decisively, and Tehran’s own
calculations. The weaker the language of deterrence becomes and the more it is
replaced by the language of containment through agreements, the greater Iran’s
ability to re-finance its proxies and rebuild its military, missile, and nuclear
infrastructure.
The same applies to the Israeli arena. When the continuity of a leadership that
adopts a policy of direct confrontation with the Iranian axis and its proxies is
disrupted, and is replaced by periods of hesitation or internal political deals
that limit freedom of military and intelligence action, the result is to give
Tehran and its arms the opportunity to reposition. In such periods, Iran regains
the ability to reactivate Hezbollah in Lebanon, reorganize the militias in Iraq
and Syria, support Palestinian armed groups, and then gradually move toward
broader attempts to influence the Gulf states and destabilize their regimes from
within through financial, media, and sectarian networks. Regional history since
2003 confirms that any vacuum in Israeli or American pressure is quickly filled
by renewed Iranian influence.
This dynamic is not theoretical. Whenever external pressure recedes, the regime
returns to the pattern of “crisis management” through proxies: igniting
relatively low-cost fronts, exhausting adversaries, and buying time for the
nuclear project. Therefore, any policy that prioritizes lowering energy prices
or avoiding short-term confrontation at the expense of long-term deterrence ends
up practically giving the Iranian regime exactly what it needs: time, resources,
and relative legitimacy.
The Error of Regional Support for the Regime: Qatar, Turkey, Pakistan, and Egypt
There is another strategic error committed by certain regional states, foremost
among them Qatar, Turkey, and Pakistan, and behind them influential circles in
Egypt. These states, or currents within them, act as if keeping the Iranian
regime away from direct confrontation—or even supporting it diplomatically,
economically, and in the media on certain files—serves their stability or
balances other powers. This calculation is fundamentally mistaken.
The Iranian regime does not recognize genuine long-term partners. It uses
interest-based alliances as long as they serve its project, then turns against
them or blackmails them when the balance of power changes. Qatar, which has
opened wide channels with Tehran; Turkey, which intersects with it on regional
and commercial files; Pakistan, which shares a complex border and fluctuating
security relations with Iran; and Egypt, where some circles try to bet on an
Iranian balancing role—all will be among the first to suffer if the regime
succeeds in acquiring nuclear capability and fully restoring its momentum.
Why? Because the doctrine of exporting the revolution does not stop at Iran’s
traditional adversaries. It views “moderate” Sunni regimes or those allied with
the West as obstacles to its project, just as it views Israel and the United
States. The experience in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and Lebanon proves that once
Iranian influence takes root, it is not content with partnership; it seeks
hegemony through militias, a parallel economy, and sectarian penetration. The
Gulf states, Egypt, and Turkey itself are not immune to this pattern if the
regime acquires a nuclear umbrella that grants it relative immunity.
The support or diplomatic cover granted to the regime today under the pretext of
“avoiding war” or “regional balance” is in reality the granting of additional
time to a project that recognizes neither borders nor permanent allies. Anyone
who thinks he can tame this regime or use it as a pressure card will, in the
event of the success of the Iranian nuclear project, be among the first to pay
the price.
Conclusion: The Real Price of Hesitation
What is required is not more negotiations that give the regime time, but a
decisive confrontation that prevents it from acquiring full nuclear capability
and severs its ties with its proxies. Plans to curb this regime and weaken it
structurally are far more important than any temporary rise in oil prices or
short-term electoral calculations. Energy prices fluctuate and recover; a
nuclear weapon in the hands of an aggressive theocratic regime detached from
reality is a permanent threat that is not easily reversible.
History does not forgive those who repeat their mistakes while knowing them.
Allowing the Iranian mullahs to reach the nuclear bomb, while deterrence
policies are weakened in Washington and Tel Aviv and the regime’s moves are
covered by certain regional capitals, is one of those mistakes that the future
will not easily forgive. The states that bet on containing this regime through
dialogue, deals, or looking the other way will discover, sooner or later, that
they did not contain it—they merely cleared its path to becoming the one that
imposes its terms.
Hopefully USA & Israel will attack
Iran & topple its satanic regime
Elias Bejjani/November 12/2026
The Jihadi Mullah Regime understands nothing but the language of force.
Hopefully, Trump, the West, and the Arab world have grasped this reality and
will work to bring it down, liberating the world from its evils
To Our Official, Partisan, Political Maronite Leaders
and Clergymen: Who Is Your Role Model, the Traitor Muqaddam Salem or the Martyr
Patriarch Daniel Al-Hadchiti?/With an article by Colonel Charbel Barakat
recounting the story of Muqaddam Salem
Elias Bejjani/November 12/2026
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2026/11/159189/
This Link
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2026/11/87002/ to a very important historical
incident, written by Colonel Charbel Barakat and published on our website on
June 20, 2020, which we are republishing today. It demonstrates the faith,
stubbornness, courage, culture, resistance, struggle, and history of the heroic
Maronites.This incident is addressed to all current Maronite leadership,
temporal, official, and religious in particular, and to all who echo their line
in politics and in national, partisan, and ecclesiastical affairs, and also to
all the rest of the political crews and the owners of party-companies and
miserable agencies. We point out here that Lebanon, in lived reality, is an
occupied country whose state is rogue, failed, and disintegrated, and the
occupier and the destructive cancer is the Persian, mullah, sectarian, and
terrorist Hezbollah. This gang-party is not part of the Lebanese fabric. It
kidnaps and holds the noble Shiite community hostage, confiscates its decision
by force, and therefore does not legitimately represent it, neither in
Parliament nor in any other arena. It did not liberate the South; rather, it
occupies it. It is not a resistance, but a gang whose members are Lebanese
mercenaries according to all international standards… The leaders of this gang
boast that they are soldiers in the army of Wilayat al-Faqih… And there are
hundreds of Iranian positions and statements that confirm this truth.
Hence, every politician, or owner of a Maronite party-company in particular, who
does not acknowledge these facts publicly and does not work seriously to
confront them by all means to liberate Lebanon, is in practice and without the
slightest doubt a clone of the traitor Muqaddam Salem.
Holy Lebanon in the Grip of
Corruption and Occupation and the Heresies of Satan Berri's Calls for Dialogue
Elias Bejjani/November 10/2026
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2026/11/159072/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9VRMbWQ5nc
Holy Lebanon's fate is controlled by clergymen who do not know God nor His
teachings, by merchant-rulers of the filthy Trojan ilk, and by a political and
partisan clique with no conscience, no integrity, and no sentiment, followers of
Iscariot and the scribes and Pharisees, and by media outlets and journalists who
are for the most part hired trumpets and cymbals skilled at nothing but
hypocrisy, verbal bluster, and marketing for their masters. And more dangerous
than all of that is the existence of an Iranian occupier, an enemy of its own
environment, of Lebanon, and of humanity, who has turned Lebanon into one of the
arenas for the wars of the insane mullahs.
And above all of this, the catastrophe of the Land of the Cedars lies in the
debauchery, prostitution, and insolence of the king of corruption and the
corrupt, Nabih Berri - Abu Mustafa - who was brought forth by the hatching
machines of the Palestinian, Syrian, and Iranian occupations.
Imagine that this ungrateful man holds in his grip a parliament whose members
are all castrated, and who were appointed through an electoral law tailored by
the mullahs to fit the evil scheme of their jihadist, terrorist, and criminal
Hezbollah, distributing seats to cowards, collaborators, and thugs.
Berri: King of Corruption and the Corrupt
Nabih Berri is not a Speaker of Parliament; he is the head of a fully integrated
corruption system. He is the protector of shady deals, the godfather of
quota-sharing, the engineer of obstructing the judiciary, the thief of the
Council of the South's funds, the cover for smuggling, drugs, and illegal
weapons, and the partner of the terrorist-Jihadist Iranian Hezbollah in
plundering the state, bankrupting it, and starving its people.
He is the one who obstructed the investigation into the Beirut Port explosion,
he is the one who protected criminals and murderers from justice, and he is the
one who turned Parliament from a legislative institution into a farm for
clientelism, bribery, and money laundering.
Berri is the last human barrier protecting Iran's mini-state in Lebanon. Without
Berri, the system of illegal weapons would have fallen. Without Berri, Hezbollah
would not have continued to control the decision of war and peace. Without
Berri, Iran would not have continued to use Lebanon as fuel for its absurd wars.
The Holy Bible says: "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you
cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion
and self-indulgence" (Matthew 23:25).
This is Berri exactly: an outside polished with speeches about dialogue and
consensus, and an inside full of extortion, corruption, and collaboration.
The Holy Bible says: "No one can serve two masters... You cannot serve God and
mammon" (Matthew 6:24). And Berri chose money, chose Iran, and sold God, the
homeland, and the people.
Berri's Satanic Call for Dialogue
This satanic Berri calls for dialogue... a dialogue to circumvent what remains
of the state for the benefit of Iran's mini-state, and to foil the current
international and regional opportunity carrying the project of peace and
liberation. It is a satanic call par excellence, because it is not a dialogue
but a conspiracy. Dialogue with whom? With murderers? With thieves of the
homeland? With those who carry weapons against the state? With those who refuse
to surrender their weapons and implement international resolutions 1559, 1701,
and 1680? True dialogue takes place between free equals under the ceiling of the
Constitution and the law, not between executioner and victim, not between
occupier and occupied, and not between a corrupt man and a hungry people.
Berri wants a dialogue that keeps the weapons, keeps the corruption, keeps the
occupation, and keeps Lebanon hostage. He wants a dialogue that reproduces the
same system with new names and old faces.
But we say to him and to his masters in Tehran: the era of poisoned dialogues is
over. The era of bargaining at the expense of blood and dignity is over. No
dialogue with weapons, no dialogue with corruption, no dialogue with occupation.
The Bible says: "And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by
the renewing of your mind" (Romans 12:2). And we will not conform to this
corrupt age; we will reject it, expose it, and resist it.
The Importance of Peace with Israel: Closing the Lebanese Arena to Iran's Wars.
Peace with Israel is not treason; it is salvation. It is not normalization with
an enemy; it is the liberation of Lebanon from its real enemy: Iran. Lebanon has
paid exorbitant prices for wars that were not its wars, and its sons have paid
with their blood for the adventures of the mullahs in Gaza, Yemen, Syria, and
Iraq. How many villages were destroyed? How many young men were martyred? How
many families were displaced? How many economies collapsed? All of this because
Iran wanted to fight Israel from Lebanese territory, and with Lebanese blood.
Peace with Israel means closing the Lebanese arena permanently to Iran's wars.
It means removing the pretext for illegal weapons. It means restoring the
decision of war and peace to the state alone. It means opening the doors to
economy, investment, and prosperity. It means Lebanon's return to its leading
role regionally and internationally in the civilized world, after Iran and its
party kidnapped it into the axis of evil and destruction.
On peace, the Lord Christ says: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be
called sons of God" (Matthew 5:9). And He also says: "Peace I leave with you, My
peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart
be troubled, neither let it be afraid" (John 14:27).
Whoever rejects peace is a son of war, a son of Satan, a son of destruction. And
whoever stands as a barrier in the face of peace is Nabih Berri himself, Iran's
faithful servant, the guard of Hezbollah's weapons, and the enemy of every free
Lebanese who wants to live in dignity and security.
Berri stands as a barrier to peace because peace means his end. Peace means a
strong state with no place for militias. Peace means an independent judiciary
with no place for the corrupt. Peace means a free economy with no place for
shady deals. Peace means a free people with no place for slaves. For this
reason, the battle for peace is an existential battle: either a Lebanon of peace
and life, or a Lebanon of Berri, Iran, and death.
A Final Word to the Puppet Rulers
To the puppet rulers without a single exception, to the owners of local and
proxy party companies, and to the owners of mitres and robes, foremost among
them our Maronite Patriach, the shepherd who has abandoned his flock, we say:
You are devils, you are thugs, you are enemies of Lebanon and the Lebanese, and
with you there is no salvation, no liberation, and no freedom, but catastrophes,
destruction, and ruin, because he who lacks something cannot give it. Rest
assured that the fire of hell and its worms await you, no matter how long the
era of your prostitution lasts.
The Bible says: "For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and
loses his own soul?" (Matthew 16:26). And you have gained money and positions,
and lost your souls, your homeland, and your eternity.
*The author, Elias Bejjani, is a Lebanese expatriate activist
Author’s Email: Phoenicia@hotmail.com
Author’s Website:
https://eliasbejjaninews.com
Report: Hezbollah detainees say were surveilling
northern area to protect Shiite towns from attack
Naharnet/November 14/2026
The five detainees belonging to Hezbollah who were arrested between the
highlands of Bsharri and Batroun confessed during interrogation that they were
conducting a preemptive reconnaissance -- or something akin to a drill -- to
determine how to protect Shiite towns within districts with a non-Shiite
majority in the event of any internal confrontation, MTV reported.
The apprehended group had previously conducted similar reconnaissance in other
areas, the TV network added.
IMF says more work needed on Lebanon reforms
Agence France Presse/November 14/2026
The International Monetary Fund said that more work is needed to reach an
agreement on restructuring Lebanon's banking sector, one of the steps towards
unlocking billions of dollars in financial assistance. An IMF staff-level
agreement reached in April 2022 laid out conditions to unlock assistance,
including a law on the distribution of losses in the banking sector, known as
the financial gap law, which parliament has still not voted on. In a statement
at the end of meetings that began on Tuesday, the IMF said "there was progress
in further clarifying the approaches under consideration by the Banque du Liban
(BdL) and the Government" regarding banking sector reform, the draft financial
regulation law and the recovery of deposits, and aligning them with
international standards".
It however noted that "further work is needed to reach an agreement on a
strategy for an effective and durable restructuring of Lebanon's banking sector,
leading to a sound and resilient system".
The cabinet submitted a draft of the law to parliament in 2025, but the text is
contested by the banking sector and political parties, preventing a vote.
Differences over estimates of losses and their distribution have stalled
negotiations with the IMF. In 2022, the government estimated losses resulting
from the 2019 financial crisis at around $70 billion, a figure believed to have
increased over the last seven years during which the crisis has remained
unresolved. Finance Minister Yassin Jaber said during a news conference that he
hoped to "achieve progress that would allow us to reach an agreement on a
program with the IMF and sign it during the first quarter of next year, and by
its end at the latest". Lebanon's economic crisis, which the World Bank has
ranked among the worst since 1850, has deprived depositors of access to all of
their funds, destroyed confidence in the banking sector and led to greater
reliance on cash liquidity in various economic and commercial activities.
Army seizes arms depot in Beirut southern suburbs
Agence France Presse/November 14/2026
The Lebanese Army announced that it seized a large number of arms and ammunition
from a depot in Beirut's southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold, adding that
it arrested one person. The army conducted "a special
security operation after close monitoring of the transportation and trade of
weapons," it said in a statement, adding that it raided an "arms depot in the
Msharrafieh area of the southern suburbs."It said it seized a "large number of
war arms and munitions" and arrested one person who is currently under
investigation. The statement made no mention of who the arms belonged to.
Beirut's southern suburbs are a key Hezbollah stronghold and faced intense
bombing and destruction during the Iran-backed group's last two wars with
Israel. The army rarely announces such raids in the southern suburbs. On October
10, Lebanese authorities arrested two suspected Hezbollah members accused of
secretly transporting a half-ton cargo of explosives, a judicial source told AFP
at the time. Based on initial investigations, one of the suspects was found to
be the son of a Hezbollah official and the other was also a member of the group,
according to the source. On October 30, a Lebanese
military court charged 13 people for their alleged involvement in shipping the
half-ton cargo of explosives to Hezbollah, a judicial source told AFP. In June,
Lebanon and Israel signed a framework agreement which included the disarmament
of Hezbollah, a gradual Israeli withdrawal from territories it occupies in the
south and the deployment of the Lebanese Army to the area.
Bitar interrogates army member as new defendant in port
case
Naharnet/November 14/2026
The judicial investigator into the Beirut port explosion case, Judge Tarek Bitar,
on Friday interrogated a new defendant in the file, Lebanese Army chief warrant
officer Roudy F., who had been tasked by the army with inspecting Hangar 12
prior to its explosion, the National News Agency said.
NNA reported that the interrogation took place in the presence of Attorney
General Judge Mohammad Saab and the lawyers representing the defendant. Bitar
had on November 4 interrogated and charged the Lebanese Army’s former chief of
staff Walid Salman and retired army brigadier generals George Moussa, Munir Abou
Zeid and Manuel Kirjian. "The interrogation of the aforementioned officers
follows the substantive pleading prepared by Attorney General Judge Mohammed
Saab, in which he pressed charges against them and requested their interrogation
over suspicions regarding their knowledge of the presence of ammonium nitrate at
the Beirut port," NNA said at the time. The massive explosion on August 4, 2020
killed more than 220 people, injured more than 6,500 and laid waste to swathes
of the capital. Lebanese authorities said the explosion was triggered by a fire
in a warehouse where tons of ammonium nitrate fertilizer had been stored
haphazardly for years, despite repeated warnings to senior officials. Nobody has
been punished for the blast despite public anger and families of the blast
victims demanding justice in a country long plagued by official impunity.
Current and former politicians, security and military officials, and civil
servants were previously charged by Bitar. The case had been bogged down by
political and legal wrangling since 2023, after Hezbollah led a campaign
demanding Bitar's removal and dozens of lawsuits also sought to remove him from
the case. However, Bitar resumed his investigations last year as Lebanon's
balance of power shifted. President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam
took office following a 2023-2024 war between Israel and Hezbollah, which
weakened the Lebanese armed group. Since then, several legal impediments to
Bitar's work have also been removed, including the lifting of a travel ban
against him.
Judicial Developments in the Case of the Five Detainees
from Hezbollah: Here Are the Details
Janoubia/November 2026
The case involving the arrest of five individuals suspected of ties to Hezbollah
in the rugged mountainous region of northern Lebanon remains at a standstill
before the military judiciary. Investigations, evidence gathering, and document
reviews are ongoing amid questions regarding the nature of their movements in
the area and their intended objectives. Meanwhile, the course of their
interrogation before the Military Examining Magistrate, Judge Claude Ghanem, has
not yet been finalized. According to the latest updates reported by Al-Jadeed
channel, Judge Ghanem has not yet questioned the five detainees. The channel
explained that the investigation in the military court is still in the phase of
gathering and comparing documents and evidence in preparation for confronting
the detainees with them—a process that requires more time. The reports added
that Hezbollah has not yet appointed lawyers to defend the detainees, and the
party will follow up on the case with legal counsel in accordance with legal
procedures. The case dates back to the arrest of five individuals in the rugged
border area between the Batroun and Bcharre districts in northern Lebanon, after
their movements in remote, uninhabited areas raised questions among security
agencies regarding the nature of their presence and the purpose of their
movements. According to judicial sources cited by Asharq Al-Awsat, preliminary
investigations are focusing on the reasons for the detainees' presence in that
area, while preliminary information suggested the possibility that they were
conducting a reconnaissance mission and geographical survey of the locations
they traversed. Sources noted that the detainees claimed their presence in the
area was for tourism, but this narrative raised questions among investigators,
especially since one of them resides in the region while the others hail from
the South and the Bekaa. Reports also mentioned that papers and maps were seized
in their possession, and that they attempted to tear some of them up upon the
approach of an Internal Security Forces patrol, while sources indicated that
other individuals were monitoring the group’s movements from a distance.
Investigations are not limited to determining the reasons for the detainees'
presence in the area; they extend to uncovering the nature of the mission they
were carrying out, the parties that may be behind their movements, and whether
they were linked to security or reconnaissance activities. According to judicial
information reported by Asharq Al-Awsat, investigations remain within the
framework of gathering data, with a tendency to focus on the individual
responsibilities of the detainees rather than assuming partisan responsibility
before evidence is completed. In this context, Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf
Salam followed up on the case, holding contacts with the Ministers of Interior
and Justice, the Public Prosecutor at the Court of Cassation, and the Director
General of the Internal Security Forces to oversee the investigations. Salam
emphasized that "the era of an absence of accountability and sweeping things
under the rug has come to an end," stressing that the investigations will have
no ceiling other than the rule of law.On the political level, Hezbollah has not
issued a clear official statement regarding the affiliation of the five
detainees, though media reports mentioned that representatives of the party made
moves with judicial authorities to follow up on their case and demand their
handover. In contrast, judicial sources stressed—according to Lebanese media
outlets—the necessity of completing the investigation in accordance with legal
procedures and determining responsibilities based on available evidence and
data.
The "Sinai Model" at the Gates of Southern Lebanon? The Backstage of the US Plan
to Replace UNIFIL and Bypass the Security Council Veto
Janoubia/November 2026
Political and diplomatic circles in Lebanon are anticipating the upcoming visit
next week of the U.S. Representative to the United Nations, Michael Waltz, to
ascertain the true American position regarding a replacement for the UNIFIL
forces, whose mandate expires on December 31. This visit comes at a time when an
American-French consensus recently emerged in Paris on the necessity of
preventing any "security vacuum" in the South, though it has not yet amounted to
a final agreement on the formula for a replacement, amid leaks revealing an
American inclination to replicate previous international experiences outside the
UN umbrella. The U.S. envoy is scheduled to meet with President General Joseph
Aoun, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam during his
visit to discuss upcoming security arrangements. In this context, notable
information circulated regarding an American drive aimed at replicating the
model of the "Multinational Force and Observers" operating in the Sinai
Peninsula since 1981—a force established at the time outside the UN framework to
bypass the Soviet veto, relying on a special protocol between the concerned
parties under direct American sponsorship. Analyzing the dimensions of this
option, political sources explained in statements to Al-Jumhouria newspaper that
the pursuit to apply the "Sinai Model" in southern Lebanon aims primarily to
avoid the political and legal complications expected if a replacement formula is
tabled within the UN Security Council. Furthermore, according to Al-Jumhouria’s
sources, this proposal seeks to dispense with the traditional powers of UNIFIL
forces tied to International Resolution 1701, which Washington and Tel Aviv now
consider insufficient to control the situation on the ground in the South.
The same sources added to the newspaper that this model grants the United States
the role of "guarantor and actual witness" to the security arrangements, which
directly intersects with the path established by the "Tripartite Framework" in
managing the border file. The sources pointed out to Al-Jumhouria that U.S.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio had paved the way for this idea days earlier by
hinting at the possibility of utilizing a "civilian monitoring force" in
southern Lebanon. However, this American proposal faces, according to estimates,
a complex and contradictory network of political calculations and security
interests of the various parties involved in the Lebanese file, making Waltz's
mission in Beirut a pivotal station to test the feasibility of this formula.
The Post-UNIFIL Era on the Table of the Three Presidents:
What Agenda Is U.S. Envoy Michael Waltz Carrying on His Fact-Finding Visit to
Beirut?
Janoubia/November 2026
Political and diplomatic attention in Beirut is directed toward the prominent
event represented by the anticipated visit of the U.S. Ambassador to the United
Nations, Michael Waltz, to the Lebanese capital, amid widespread anticipation
regarding the agenda he is carrying concerning the future of security
arrangements in southern Lebanon and the post-UNIFIL phase. This diplomatic
movement comes at a sensitive juncture where international efforts to prevent a
"security vacuum" in the South intersect with sharp divergences in visions.
Official Lebanon and the military establishment insist on maintaining an
effective international military presence under the UN umbrella, categorically
rejecting proposals to replace international forces with "civilian monitoring
committees" or being dragged into direct field coordination formulas with the
Israeli side. At the same time, this raises legitimate fears among the residents
of southern villages regarding the repercussions of any uncalculated
international withdrawal. Waltz's visit aims to explore positions and discuss
the formula for a replacement force for UNIFIL, noting that the international
scene currently witnesses an initial American-French consensus—crystallized
recently in Paris—stipulating the necessity of avoiding any security vacuum in
the South, even though the two parties have not yet reached a final agreement on
the shape and powers of this replacement. For its part, Al-Liwaa newspaper
reported from informed political sources that Waltz's visit falls within the
framework of a "fact-finding mission" to discuss circulating proposals regarding
the replacement force, confirming that the Lebanese side will inform the
American official of a unified stance emphasizing the danger of leaving the
South exposed to any security vacuum. In the same context, an official source
noted in statements to Nidaa Al-Watan that Lebanon maintains its categorical
refusal to replace international forces with a civilian monitoring committee or
bodies affiliated with non-governmental organizations, insisting on the
inevitability of a "military presence" in the South, whether it continues under
the UN umbrella or is carried out via international sponsorship with the
participation of countries friendly to Lebanon. This was also confirmed by Al-Liwaa
sources, pointing to a Lebanese political consensus to push toward a firm
proposal guaranteeing that this force operates under a clear UN cover.
In contrast to the official Lebanese position, concerning background data
emerges indicating an American desire—whose contours were shaped by the head of
the "Mechanism Committee," General Joseph Clearfield—aimed at clearing southern
Lebanon of any international force regardless of its shape. According to Nidaa
Al-Watan, this proposal aims to pave the way for imposing "joint
Israeli-Lebanese patrols" within the area known as the "Yellow Line" under the
pretext of preventing a security vacuum following the withdrawal of
international forces, which practically means ruling out any other international
solution.However, this path faces a categorical and decisive rejection by the
Lebanese Army leadership, especially after Israel demanded that coordination and
field dealings be restricted exclusively between it and the Lebanese Army
without any international intermediary—something the military institution and
political authority reject due to the extremely dangerous sovereign and security
hazards it entails.
On the field and social levels, these diplomatic entanglements cast a heavy
shadow over the residents of border villages in southern Lebanon, particularly
Christian towns. Fears are mounting among residents that the Israeli occupation
might exploit any withdrawal of UNIFIL forces from their positions to expand on
the ground and occupy evacuated points, thereby cementing a new "fait accompli"
on the ground that makes the implementation of a full Israeli withdrawal
according to the "Framework Agreement" extremely difficult and complex.
These apprehensions multiply in the event of a delayed formation of the
replacement force or if its role is limited to a restricted "monitoring force"
formula that lacks effective executive powers on the ground, being confined
instead to recording facts, monitoring developments, or providing theoretical
support for the deployment of the Lebanese Army should Israel permit it, and
assisting residents returning to certain liberated villages. This leaves the
fate of the region hanging in suspense, awaiting the decisive answers Waltz's
visit will bring.
After Trump Sidelined Vance... Will Some Domestic
Factions Remain Clinging to the Islamabad Track?
Lara Yazbek/Al-Markazia/November 14, 2026
(Translated by AI from Arabic)
Al-Markazia – In statements made from Paris, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio
announced Washington's categorical refusal to negotiate with Iran regarding the
Lebanese file, affirming that Lebanon is an independent, sovereign state and
that the United States deals exclusively with Lebanese state institutions. The
U.S. Secretary clarified that his country deals directly with the Lebanese
government, President Joseph Aoun, and the Lebanese Army to determine the
country's future and implement existing agreements. Rubio stressed that
Lebanon's future is decided by the Lebanese people and their elected government,
not Tehran, asking disapprovingly: "Why would we negotiate with Iran about
Lebanon? That is none of their business."These statements come in response to
Tehran's efforts to link a ceasefire in Lebanon to the broader Iranian-American
agreement, and in response to demands by Hezbollah and those in its orbit in
Lebanon to include the Lebanese file in the Islamabad negotiations. In his
latest speech, Hezbollah Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem noted that "Iran's
assistance to us through the Iranian-American Memorandum of Understanding is
what brought us to de-escalation and the current state we are in," in the
context of urging the abandonment of direct negotiations and placing the
Lebanese card in Tehran's pocket. In form, there is a glaring paradox that
warrants pausing over, according to sovereignist political sources speaking to
"Al-Markazia": external parties are showing more respect for the Lebanese state
and its institutions than parties holding Lebanese citizenship. Rubio wants to
negotiate with the Lebanese state about Lebanon, whereas Hezbollah wants Iran to
negotiate with the United States about Lebanon! It is a tragicomic reality, the
sources continue, before pointing out that Rubio's positions clearly indicate
U.S. insistence on moving forward with Lebanese-Israeli negotiations—even if
after a while, i.e., once the new governmental landscape in Tel Aviv becomes
clear. They also indicate that the sponsor of these negotiations, Rubio himself,
is committed to them and their sponsorship, and that he does not appear likely
to step down voluntarily or be removed from the file by U.S. President Donald
Trump in favor of another person or a different approach to the Lebanese-Israeli
issue. Thus, the U.S. approach appears to remain unchanged in form and
substance, both before and after the U.S. midterm elections.
However, what may change, the sources add, is the Islamabad track and its
sponsor, U.S. Vice President JD Vance, as Trump announced on Thursday that he
does not need an agreement with Iran, hinting that there is no need to continue
negotiating with it nor for the meetings Vance was preparing with Iranian
officials to push the agreement forward. Under these circumstances, will the
"Resistance Axis" (Al-Mumani'un) continue to demand joining the Islamabad track?
Post-UNIFIL on the Table of the Three Presidents... Aoun: A Comprehensive
Approach to the Monopoly of Weapons, and Geagea: The State is Belittling Itself
Hezbollah: No End to the Resistance and Weapons, Not Even After a Hundred Years
Al-Markaziyah/November 14, 2026
To the rhythm of the widening divergence between the logic of the state and the
logic of weapons, security and sovereign exigencies are advancing to the
forefront of the domestic scene. These include the future of UNIFIL and the
post-Resolution 1701 phase—developments regarding which are expected to surface
during the anticipated visit of U.S. Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz to Beirut
next Monday and Tuesday, and his meetings with Presidents Joseph Aoun, Nawaf
Salam, and Nabih Berri. Information suggests a strong American push for a model
similar to the Multinational Force and Observers in Sinai, alongside the issue
of weapon monopolization and security investigations that strongly re-ignite
questions regarding the state's authority and its limits.
While the President of the Republic insists on retaining the international
umbrella in the South—even in a modified formula or via an alternative mechanism
that prevents any security vacuum—France is striving to craft a substitute
formula for the peacekeeping forces in coordination with Washington, though
without reaching an agreement as of yet, which appears difficult to achieve.
1701 as a Reference: The post-UNIFIL file was present at Baabda Palace today
when President Joseph Aoun received UN Under-Secretary-General Amina Mohammed,
who affirmed that "the UN will stand by Lebanon," stressing "the importance of
keeping the conditions it is going through at the forefront of international
attention, and closely monitoring developments, especially in light of the
transitional phase linked to the future of UNIFIL."
For his part, President Aoun stressed that "Lebanon's priority remains the
continuation of UNIFIL's mission and the renewal of its mandate, while remaining
open to discussing the expansion of the scope of its work in a manner that
accounts for field requirements and emerging circumstances." He emphasized "the
importance of the role played by these forces in the South, not only on the
security level, but also through their logistical and engineering capabilities
and relations with local communities." He clarified that "if continuing the
mission in its current form proves impossible during 2027, Lebanon insists on
the necessity of UNIFIL continuing to carry out its tasks throughout the
transitional phase designated for its withdrawal, or working to find an
alternative mechanism under the UN umbrella to ensure no security or
institutional vacuum occurs in the South." The President affirmed that
"Resolution 1701 must remain the legal reference and basis for any future
international arrangements in the South," calling on the UN to support Lebanon
in preserving this framework and ensuring the continuity of an effective
international presence.
Comprehensive Approach: Furthermore, President Aoun pointed to "the importance
of Article 10 of the Tripartite Framework, which constitutes an essential
gateway to addressing the issue of the monopoly of weapons in the hands of the
state through a comprehensive approach that is not limited to the military
aspect, but also encompasses political, social, economic, humanitarian, and
developmental dimensions." He stressed that "sustainably addressing this issue
requires providing conditions that enhance citizens' trust in the state and its
institutions, securing them security, services, and a decent livelihood,"
pointing out that "focusing on military solutions alone is not enough to achieve
the desired goals." Internal Security: On the security front as well, the
President reviewed the country's security situation with the Director General of
General Security, Major General Hassan Choucair, in light of data available to
General Security, in addition to movement at land, sea, and air crossings.
Between Lebanon and Syria: For his part, Minister of Interior Brigadier General
Ahmed Al-Hajjar clarified, on the eve of his departure to Syria to meet his
Syrian counterpart, Interior Minister Anas Khattab, that the areas of
cooperation between the two countries are vast and wide-ranging, affirming
"there is a will by both the Lebanese and Syrian states to activate this
cooperation." He added in an interview with the Cairo-based "Al-Ghad" channel:
"It is in our interest that our relations with Syria be in the best possible
shape, given the many shared challenges—starting with legitimate borders and
illegal entry, all the way to major economic interests that all call for further
coordination."
The Minister of Interior reviewed the "good results" achieved by the two
countries in combating drugs through "great and effective coordination." He
added that "the change in the Syrian regime contributed positively to tightening
control and activating the fight, because the current Syrian state is working to
combat drugs." He also affirmed "great effectiveness in combating terrorism and
extremism," pointing out that this file receives "constant follow-up, where any
possibility of drifting toward extremism and terrorist ideology is tracked, and
proactive arrests are carried out amidst high effectiveness by the security
agencies." He added that these agencies requested "precautionary measures around
places of worship and intensified security deployment for greater effectiveness
based on information analysis, following the unfortunate and unprecedented
incident witnessed in Jordan."
Judicial Achievement: In another field, and in an achievement reflecting
Lebanon's standing and role in joint Arab judicial work, Lebanon was unanimously
elected as a member of the Executive Bureau of the Council of Arab Justice
Ministers for a two-year term, following its candidacy for this membership. This
step confirms Arab trust in Lebanon and its ability to actively contribute to
the development of legal and judicial cooperation among Arab states. Lebanese
Minister of Justice Adel Nassar participated in the proceedings of the 42nd
session of the Council of Arab Justice Ministers, held in Algiers.
The State "Belittling Itself": In political stances, Lebanese Forces Party
leader Samir Geagea considered during his participation in the annual dinner
hosted by the Lebanese Forces coordination committee in the Batroun region that
the Lebanese state "is belittling itself with its own hands," and that some of
those in charge of it are working, through their practices and disregard for
serious security realities, to undermine the image of the actual state that the
Lebanese have waited decades to see established. He warned that continuing this
approach will lead to a loss of confidence in the state and its institutions,
reaching a stage where no one takes Lebanon seriously anymore.
He stressed that what was uncovered in the overlapping region between Bcharre
and Batroun, and the prior seizure of the explosives shipment in Dahr al-Baidar,
pose an issue far beyond investigating drivers, drivers' assistants, or
individuals caught at specific locations. The core issue, he stated, lies in the
existence of a military and security organization operating outside the
framework of the state, its laws, and its decisions, while the relevant
authorities avoid reaching the leadership bodies standing behind these
activities, despite officials in Hezbollah declaring responsibility for some of
them. He asked: "How can a state that respects itself suffice with investigating
a truck driver carrying explosives, while the party standing behind it claims
responsibility for it?" He considered that the function of an investigation is
not to stop at the executors, but to reach those who gave orders, planned, and
made the decision, and that overlooking this truth means the state continues to
evade its constitutional and legal responsibilities.
"Disarming Will Not Happen": In contrast, MP Ali Al-Mikdad, a member of the
Loyalty to the Resistance bloc, asserted that "we have no problem with all those
who do not align with the American and Israeli orientation; we are able to sit
together and dialogue on ways to get out of our crisis and generate solutions to
our problems. But by what logic is the primary condition the disarmament and
ending of the resistance, in light of the occupation of our land and daily
attacks on our towns? This will not happen today, nor tomorrow, nor after 100
years."
During his hosting by former Minister Hamad Hassan at his residence in Baalbek,
Mikdad touched upon the Bcharre incident, pointing out that "4 or 5 young men
lost their way with their car in the Bcharre area. Some newcomers to Lebanese
political life, who lack national and humanitarian sense, spun many scenarios,
accusing the unarmed young men of false charges and portraying the matter as if
there were an assassination attempt using sniper rifles in Bcharre or
elsewhere."
Erdogan in Akkar: Furthermore, Bilal Erdogan, the son of Turkish President Recep
Tayyip Erdogan, continued his visit to Lebanon for the third consecutive day,
visiting today the Akkar town of Kawachra, where he received a massive popular
welcome from Lebanese locals of Turkmen origin. He was welcomed by the Mufti of
Akkar, Sheikh Zeid Bakar Zakaria, at the Akkar Dar Al-Fatwa.
Erdogan affirmed in a television statement that "the Mecca Agreement will
protect the entire region, including Lebanon." Following his tour in Akkar,
Erdogan headed to Beirut to meet Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, who hosted a lunch
banquet in his honor at the conclusion of his visit to Lebanon.
Restraint from Attack: On the international-regional front, Reuters cited three
informed sources as saying that U.S. President Donald Trump told his senior
advisors over the past few days that he might refrain from attacking Iran if the
United States does not face any new provocations from Tehran or its allied
Houthis in Yemen. A White House official said that President Trump is the sole
decision-maker holding the reins and that the United States is in a strong
position thanks to its control over the Strait of Hormuz and the collapse of the
Iranian economy.
Resolution 1701 is the Primary Reference... President Aoun Affirms to UN Deputy
Secretary-General that Priority is for the Continuation of "UNIFIL" or Finding
an Alternative Mechanism Under the UN Umbrella
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
President of the Republic Joseph Aoun received United Nations Deputy
Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, affirming that "the Lebanese priority remains
the continuation of UNIFIL's mission and the renewal of its mandate, while
remaining open to finding an alternative mechanism under the UN umbrella to
prevent any security vacuum." Aoun stressed that "Resolution 1701 must remain
the legal reference and the foundation for any future international arrangements
in the South," noting that "addressing the issue of the state's monopoly on arms
is carried out through an approach that encompasses security, political, social,
economic, humanitarian, and developmental considerations." For her part,
Mohammed emphasized that "security and military approaches must be accompanied
by developmental, humanitarian, and institutional efforts to put an end to the
suffering of the population."
Salam Discusses
Future of UNIFIL with UN Official... Lebanon Rejects Any International Vacuum in
the South
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Prime Minister Nawaf Salam discussed with UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina
Mohammed ways to enhance cooperation between Lebanon and the international
organization, particularly in the fields of mental health and psychosocial
support, alongside the future of the international presence in southern Lebanon
as the mandate of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) nears its
end. Salam stressed the necessity of avoiding any international
vacuum in the South and maintaining stability through the continuation of an
international presence mandated by the Security Council. The meeting was
attended by Minister of Social Affairs Haneen Al-Sayyed, Minister of Education
and Higher Education Rima Karami, and Minister of Public Health Rakan Nasreddine.
Discussions covered ways to support the National Mental Health Program
affiliated with the Ministry of Public Health, develop psychosocial support
programs implemented by the Ministry of Social Affairs, and expand mental health
awareness within schools. Regarding the file of the South, Salam affirmed the
necessity of maintaining an international presence with a Security Council
mandate to contribute to preserving stability and supporting the implementation
of International Resolution 1701. He expressed Lebanon's openness to consulting
with Security Council member states and the United Nations to reach a new
resolution that ensures the continuation of the international role in the region
after UNIFIL's mandate expires, thereby avoiding any security or field vacuum.
The Prime Minister reiterated the need to respect Lebanon's sovereignty and
territorial integrity, ensure a complete Israeli withdrawal from all
Lebanese territories up to the internationally recognized borders, halt Israeli
attacks, and extend the authority of the Lebanese state over its entire
territory through its own forces. These discussions come as UNIFIL's mandate
approaches expiration, amid Lebanese diplomatic moves to consult with the UN and
Security Council members regarding the formula for the upcoming international
presence, ensuring continued support for stability in the South and the ongoing
implementation of Resolution 1701.
Massive Fire in a Displaced Persons Camp in Zahlé District: 30 Tents and a Car
Engulfed in Flames
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
A fire broke out in a displaced persons camp in the Bar Elias area – Al-Saada
Road, in the Zahlé District, resulting in the burning of 30 tents in addition to
a Renault Mégane car, according to an announcement by the Lebanese General
Directorate of Civil Defense. The Directorate's Information and Public Relations
Department explained in a statement that Civil Defense elements intervened to
extinguish the blaze with the participation of teams from several centers,
working to contain the flames and prevent their spread before managing to fully
control and extinguish them. In a related context, the fire resulted in one
person suffering from smoke inhalation. Civil Defense teams transferred him to
Al-Nassera Hospital in Bar Elias to receive treatment and undergo necessary
medical examinations. The statement did not mention the causes of the fire,
while reported damages were limited to the burned tents and the car.
Following the Circulation of the "Honor" Narrative in the
Al-Alwani Case, General Security Responds
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
The Lebanese General Directorate of General Security denied what was circulated
across social media platforms and media outlets regarding the Director General
of General Security, Major General Hassan Choucair, informing Iraqi authorities
or political figures that the case of former Iraqi MP Ahmed Al-Alwani is linked
to "moral reasons" or "honor," affirming that this information is entirely
baseless. The Media Bureau of the General Directorate of General Security
explained in a statement that the circulating allegations are completely false
and bear no relation to reality, categorically denying that any stance of this
meaning was issued by Major General Choucair.General Security urged accuracy and
responsibility in circulating information, calling for a return to authorized
official sources before publishing any incorrect data or rumors. This denial
comes in the wake of controversy accompanying the case of former Iraqi MP Ahmed
Al-Alwani, after the Iraqi Embassy in Beirut announced it had received his body
from the Lebanese side following the issuance of the coroner's report and the
matching of DNA test results with samples taken from his son.
Bilal Erdogan from Tripoli: We need Lebanon to be united
internally
Naharnet/November 14/2026
Bilal Erdogan, the son of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, paid an visit
to the northern city of Tripoli on Friday, where he began his tour at the al-Tal
Square and inspected the historic Sultan Abdul Hamid Clock Tower, which served
as a symbolic gift to the city of Tripoli. He then toured the city's old souks
and visited Salam al-Sibai, one of Sultan Abdul Hamid's granddaughters.
Erdogan later moved to the Grand Mansouri Mosque, where he was received
by the Mufti of Tripoli and the North, Sheikh Mohammad Imam, the Mayor of
Tripoli, Abdul Hamid Karimeh, and a crowd of the city's prominent figures,
inspecting the Relic of the Noble Prophet section. Following that, Erdogan
participated in a broad meeting in the mosque's courtyard, at the invitation of
Dar Al-Fatwa and with the participation of Deputy Prime Minister Tarek Mitri,
alongside parliamentary, spiritual, economic, and social figures from the city,
in addition to the artist Maher Zain. “I know very well that this love is not
directed at me personally, but is an indicator of the great longing and
affection for the President of the Republic of Turkey, and proof of your love
and appreciation for his father. I would like to begin by thanking our
Tripolitan brothers who have always invited us to Tripoli over these years.
Unfortunately, the developments and problems witnessed in this region during the
past ten years in Turkey made it difficult for us to make this visit throughout
that period," Erdogan said. He stated: "Now, after
assessing the recent conditions in the region and the developments taking place
in Syria, Turkey, and the West, I found that this is the appropriate time to
visit the city of Tripoli. On this occasion, I convey the greetings of the
President of our Republic to all our Tripolitan brothers who warmly long for our
President and for Turkey. He sends his regards to you all.""If we want to
prepare a bright future for our children, sons, and grandchildren, and build
brighter fates and days for them, we must re-establish the bonds of brotherhood
among us very strongly. We need Lebanon to be united internally, for Turkey to
be a sister to Lebanon, for Syria to be a sister to Lebanon, and for Turkey and
Syria to be sisters -- meaning that all Islamic and neighboring brotherly
countries must care first for their close brothers before anyone else,” Erdogan
went on to say.He added that Lebanon and Syria “must stand closely together” and
“the bonds of brotherhood between them must be very strong, as well as between
Turkey and Syria.” “In general, the bonds of brotherhood among all Muslims must
be extremely cohesive for the sake of the region's renaissance," Erdogan said.
Lebanon’s president reassures Christians as they remain
under pressure
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun denied there is a danger to the Christian
presence in the country, but the faithful there continue to face violence,
displacement, and pressure to leave.
Romy Haber/EWTN News/November 14/2026
On Oct. 28, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun told a delegation of French
lawmakers who belong to a study group on Eastern Christians that “there is no
danger to the Christian presence in Lebanon.” He pointed to the country’s
tradition of Christian-Muslim coexistence and argued that what had happened in
neighboring countries could not happen in Lebanon.Aoun’s remarks come amid
concerns about the security and future of Lebanon’s Christian communities, as
families face violence, displacement, and pressure to emigrate. Lebanon’s
political system formally recognizes the partnership between its Christian and
Muslim communities. Under its long-standing power-sharing arrangement, the
president is a Maronite Christian, the prime minister a Sunni Muslim, and the
speaker of Parliament a Shiite Muslim. Parliamentary seats are divided equally
between Christians and Muslims. Christian participation is therefore part of the
country’s founding political understanding. Aoun’s assurance is weighed against
the experiences of Christian communities across the country. On Oct. 29,
Maronite Father Samir Daou was found murdered by a Syrian worker. Months
earlier, Father Pierre al-Rahi was killed by Israeli shelling. In February 2025,
Armenian Apostolic Archimandrite Anania Kojanian was killed at his home. The
losses extend beyond the clergy. In the past few months, Israeli strikes killed
dentist James Karam and his children, Tony and Theodosia, as well as Pierre
Moawad; his wife, Flavia Mourad; and Roula Matar.
In the past years, the killings of Pascal Sleiman and Elias Hasrouni, both
associated with the Lebanese Forces, a Christian political party opposed to
Hezbollah, have also deepened fears. Fadi Bejjani, a former bodyguard to a
Christian politician, died in a separate incident: a 2023 shootout involving
local residents and Hezbollah gunmen after a truck carrying the group’s
ammunition overturned. The circumstances of these deaths differ, but they
highlight the most basic condition for remaining in Lebanon: personal security.
In the south, the danger also takes the form of uprooting entire communities.
Christian villages near the Israeli border have been caught in the conflict
between Israel and Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Shiite political and armed
movement designated by the United States as a terrorist organization.
In Qawzah, Father Antonios Hanna, pastor of St. Joseph Parish, recently told
EWTN News that residents had been displaced as their village became a
battleground. Homes and the parish church have sustained damage.
Christians who have stayed in Rmeish, Ain Ebel, and Debel, three villages near
Lebanon’s border with Israel known as the “delta of resilience” face a different
ordeal. Residents are cut off from jobs, universities, and hospitals, and are
dependent on coordinated convoys to leave or return to their home. Despite their
attachment to their land, insecurity makes staying difficult, while displaced
families need safety and reconstruction to return. Hezbollah has dragged
Christian communities into a war they did not choose and cannot afford. Its
disarmament is on the government’s agenda, and Lebanese authorities have
intercepted explosives shipments and tightened financial restrictions. Yet these
measures have so far had limited impact on the group’s ability to defy state
authority and exert political and military influence.
The politics of land
Land is another part of the same question. Cardinal Bechara Boutros al-Rai, the
Maronite patriarch, has warned of increasing land sales and urged Christian
owners not to surrender the roots and future those properties represent.
Various politicians, media outlets, and research centers have alleged that
Hezbollah and affiliated financiers are behind large land purchases in Christian
areas. Buying and selling property is normal in any country. But reports of
coordinated purchases, unclear funding, and offers above market prices have
raised fears that these transactions serve a strategy to expand the group’s
territorial and political control.
Representation, employment, and emigrationMeaningful participation in national
life is equally important. A Christian president does not answer every question
about Christians’ access to public employment and responsibility within state
institutions.
For example, as reported by the Lebanese newspaper Nidaa al-Watan, only three of
54 trainee accountants covered by a decree on transfers and appointments in
public administrations were Christians. Lebanon’s constitution reserves
Christian-Muslim parity for the highest civil-service positions while making
qualifications and competence the standard for other public employment. However,
certain figures warrant transparent answers about recruitment and access. Then
there is the future of the young. A 2024 Arab Barometer survey found that 58% of
Lebanese people ages 18 to 29 wanted to emigrate. That figure concerns Lebanese
youth generally, rather than Christians alone. Lack of opportunities,
instability, and the difficult financial crisis are making it hard for youth to
stay in their homeland.
Nonetheless, when young Christians leave in search of work and stability, their
villages and parishes lose the families they might have formed and the skills
they might have contributed. A parish’s future depends on whether the next
generation can afford to build a life around it.
Like all Lebanese, Christians have the right to live in peace on their own land,
free from war and the coercive power of Islamist militias. The guarantee they
need is a state capable of making those rights part of everyday life.
https://www.ewtnnews.com/world/middle-east/lebanon-s-president-reassures-christians-as-they-remain-under-pressure
This story was first published by ACI MENA, the Arabic-language sister
service of EWTN News. It has been translated and adapted by EWTN News English.
The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News
published on November
14-15/2026
(Some of the News reports below are
translated from Arabic by AI)
Trump, Xi, Putin to hold historic meeting in China
Agence France Presse/November 14/2026
Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping will hold the first three-way
meeting between the leaders of the United States, Russia and China at a summit
in Shenzhen next week, the White House said Friday. Trump wants to talk about
reducing nuclear arsenals at the trilateral talks on Thursday and is also set to
bring up his war in Iran -- but he is not expected to discuss Russia's war in
Ukraine, U.S. officials said. The three leaders will meet on the sidelines of
the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in the southern Chinese city, White
House spokeswoman Olivia Wales told reporters. "The
president has made it clear that, among other topics, he will discuss the
reduction of nuclear weapons in the world. This proliferation, President Trump
believes, is very dangerous," Wales said. One of the
major conflicts dominating Trump's second term as president will feature, but
the other will not, the US officials said. "I think the president does intend to
talk about Iran in the trilateral meeting with Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin," a
senior U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told reporters on a
call. Washington has a "whole other track" of negotiations with Kyiv and Moscow
aimed at ending the war in Ukraine, the official added, referring to talks that
U.S. envoys have had in recent days with Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr
Zelensky. "China is not really a part of that track, so it doesn't seem
appropriate to have the Ukraine discussion there," the official added.
Yalta redux? -
The meeting calls back to the 1945 Yalta summit in the Soviet Union, where then-U.S.
president Franklin D. Roosevelt, Britain's Winston Churchill and Soviet leader
Joseph Stalin laid out the post-WWII settlement and new territorial boundaries
in Europe. Zelensky has raised the alarm that the meeting in Shenzhen could be a
Yalta-like "redistribution of spheres of influence" for the 21st century.
The Trump administration has sought to reassert U.S. dominance over the
"Western hemisphere" -- including by capturing Venezuelan President Nicolas
Maduro in January -- but splitting the world among great powers like it's 1945
may not guarantee security. Trump will also hold a bilateral working lunch and
meeting with the Chinese president on Thursday -- their fourth meeting since the
U.S. president's return to power last year. But Trump is not scheduled to have a
separate one-on-one with Putin. Among other topics, Nvidia chief executive
Jensen Huang's resignation over an affair with an alleged Chinese spy is not
expected to come up in Trump's meetings with Xi, the officials said.
"The situation with Nvidia should not really have any bearing on the
trip," a second U.S. senior official said. The United States also did not plan
to discuss export controls on sensitive chip technology, which were at the heart
of the Nvidia scandal. "We do not negotiate American export controls. These are
national security matters that we develop in the administration... and we don't
expect it to figure at all in any of our conversations with the Chinese while
we're there," the second official said. Tesla and
SpaceX boss Elon Musk will accompany Trump on his trip to China but will not be
involved in the meeting with Xi and Putin, the officials said. Trump will leave
Washington on Monday and arrive in the Philippines on Tuesday for a summit of
the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) before heading to Shenzhen.
Netanyahu Calls on Eisenkot to Join a “National Unity
Government” to Eliminate the “Iranian Threat”
Al-Sharq Al-Awsat/November 15, 2026
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on Gadi Eisenkot, head of the Yesh Atid
party and a member of the Knesset, to join him in forming a national unity
government on Saturday, stressing the need to “eliminate the Iranian threat once
and for all.”In a video posted on the X platform, Netanyahu said: “The necessary
response to those who deliberately walked out while ‘Hatikvah’ was being sung is
to form a government of hope, a national unity government.”Netanyahu’s remarks
followed an incident during the swearing-in ceremony of the 26th Knesset on
Tuesday, when lawmakers from the Joint List walked out while the national
anthem, “Hatikvah,” was being performed. Meanwhile, Ra’am party leader Mansour
Abbas and members of his parliamentary bloc remained standing during the anthem.
Netanyahu said that his conversation with Eisenkot on Thursday had reinforced
his belief that Israel needed a government bringing together all parties that
recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people, according to The Jerusalem
Post. He explained: “This meeting only strengthened my understanding of how
essential it is to establish a national unity government at this time, one that
includes all parties supporting the existence of the State of Israel as the
state of the Jewish people, and one capable of confronting the enormous and
complex security challenges facing us.”Netanyahu addressed Eisenkot directly,
urging him to abandon his efforts to form an alternative coalition and instead
enter negotiations without preconditions. He added: “Rather than trying to form
a fragile and dangerous government that would not be capable, even to the
slightest degree, of confronting the enormous security and national challenges
facing us, let us do the obvious thing. Let us enter a room, without
preconditions, put aside all disagreements and all boycotts, and reach
agreements in the interest of Israel’s security and future, including the issue
of military conscription, which can be resolved in cooperation with
representatives of the Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) community.”This appeal comes amid
efforts by Eisenkot, whom Israeli President Isaac Herzog tasked with forming the
next government, to assemble a coalition following the October 27 elections.
For his part, Israeli Prime Minister-designate Gadi Eisenkot denounced
Netanyahu’s call for a national unity government and negotiations as a “trick,”
ahead of scheduled talks between their respective parties on Sunday. Eisenkot
said: “Netanyahu is calling for negotiations whose outcome has already been
predetermined. He insists that he wants unity, but (...) he is sowing division
and fueling tensions, as though there were no tomorrow.”He considered his rival
fully aware that he had lost the election, addressing him directly: “Nice try,
but these tricks do not fool me.”Netanyahu continued: “The Iranian regime, which
seeks to destroy Israel, is once again working to revive its nuclear program.
Let there be no doubt: this murderous regime, which has not hesitated to kill
thousands of its own people, will not hesitate to use nuclear weapons against
us.”
He warned that Tehran would use such weapons once it succeeded in resuming
uranium enrichment and accelerating the development of its nuclear
weapons.Netanyahu said Israel must continue preventing Iran from achieving that
objective, citing the military operations known as “Rising Lion” and “Lion’s
Roar” as examples. He concluded: “We must eliminate this existential threat
hanging over our heads once and for all.”
Your tricks don't fool me".. Eisenkot attacks Netanyahu
and rejects his call for a unity government
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Prime Minister-designate Gadi Eisenkot escalated his attack on caretaker Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday, describing his call to form a national
unity government and begin political negotiations as a "trick," aimed, according
to him, at concealing the state of division and tension that his rival is
fueling. Eisenkot's remarks came ahead of anticipated talks between their two
parties on Sunday, in response to Netanyahu's call to form a national
reconciliation government, amid an intensifying political struggle over
leadership of the next government. Eisenkot said Netanyahu is calling for
pre-determined negotiations, while at the same time speaking about the need for
unity, but continuing, in his words, to sow division and stoke tensions, as if
the future holds no challenges.
Addressing his rival, he added: "Nice try, but these tricks don't fool me,"
considering that Netanyahu knows he lost the elections, and that his call for
unity does not necessarily reflect a genuine desire to reach a political
understanding. In contrast, Netanyahu called on Eisenkot to form a "national
reconciliation government," stressing that he concluded, following a security
meeting that brought them together on Thursday, that there is a need to form a
unity government capable of facing the major and complex security challenges
facing Israel. Netanyahu told Eisenkot that his party is ready to enter
negotiations without preconditions, and to set aside differences and boycotts,
with the aim of reaching agreements concerning Israel's security and future.
Netanyahu pointed out that the anticipated negotiations must include the various
contentious files, including the issue of compulsory conscription, in an attempt
to reach understandings that ensure the formation of a government capable of
dealing with internal and security challenges. This political confrontation
comes at a time when attention is turning to government formation negotiations,
after the elections held on October 27, which did not give either camp a
parliamentary majority, while Eisenkot received the mandate from President Isaac
Herzog to form a governing coalition. Between Netanyahu's calls for unity and
Eisenkot's accusations of maneuvering and deception, the anticipated
negotiations appear to be a decisive test of the two sides' ability to overcome
their differences and reach a formula that allows the formation of the next
government.
Israeli army says it targeted a senior commander in Hamas's military wing...
Killing of Samir Abu Younis, commander of the "Rafah Brigade"
Riyadh: Al Arabiya.net and agencies / November 14, 2026
The Israeli army said on Sunday that it targeted a senior commander in the
military wing of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas). Hamas
sources told Reuters that an Israeli airstrike killed Samir Abu Younis, a senior
commander in the movement's military wing, in an attack in Khan Younis. The
targeting of Abu Younis comes less than two months after his appointment to lead
the "Rafah Brigade," following a strike that targeted a tent for displaced
people in the "Al-Mawasi" area in the city of Khan Younis in the southern Gaza
Strip. The Israeli army targeted the tent where Abu Younis was present with a
number of missiles, which led to fires breaking out in dozens of neighboring
tents, and injuries among a number of Palestinians at the location, according to
Al Arabiya's correspondent. It is noted that Abu Younis had taken over command
of the "Rafah Brigade" after the assassination of his predecessor in the
position, Nael Abu Obeid, in an Israeli strike that targeted the same area. The
Israeli army is intensifying its targeting of Hamas military officials, having
announced days ago that it targeted the commander of the "Khan Younis Brigade,"
in a bombing that targeted the "Nasser Medical Complex."In less than two months,
the Israeli army killed Rafah Brigade commander Nael Abu Obeid, northern Gaza
Strip Brigade commander Ezzedine Al-Baik, and also killed Khan Younis Brigade
commander Mohammed Al-Yazouri.
Eisenkot: Netanyahu calls for unity while practicing incitement and division /
Eisenkot in response to Netanyahu: His call for negotiations is just a political
maneuver
Al Arabiya.net and agencies/November 14, 2026
Gadi Eisenkot, leader of the Israeli "Yashar" party, tasked with forming a
government in Israel, said in response to caretaker Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu that he talks about unity while practicing incitement and
division, pointing out that his call for negotiations is just a political
maneuver.
Eisenkot added that he is continuing efforts to form a national emergency
government as soon as possible, noting that "Netanyahu realizes his defeat and
is trying to obstruct the formation of a new government."Eisenkot stressed,
saying: "Netanyahu joining an emergency government is conditional on accepting
my principles." Shortly before that, Netanyahu renewed his call on Saturday to
form a national unity government with his rival Gadi Eisenkot, considering it
the only way to "ensure Israel's security" in the face of Iran, which he pledged
to eliminate its threat "once and for all."
Netanyahu said in a video statement that his meeting on Thursday with Eisenkot
"solidified his conviction that it is necessary at the present time to form a
national unity government" capable of "ensuring Israel's security for many years
to come." Israeli Channel 12 had earlier reported that the leader of the "Yashar"
party, Gadi Eisenkot, decided to give priority to attempting to form a governing
coalition with the ultra-Orthodox parties, in what appears to be an adoption of
a strategy pushed by the leader of the "Yisrael Beiteinu" party, Avigdor
Lieberman, who opposes forming a coalition that relies on Arab parties,
according to the Times of Israel website. Eisenkot had indicated that he would
push toward forming a minority government based exclusively on the four Zionist
parties in the anti-Benjamin Netanyahu camp, but such a government would have
needed the support of the two Arab parties to gain the Knesset's confidence.
After the Iran War.. Israeli Fears of an Uncalculated
Surprise
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
The Israeli Broadcasting Authority said that Tel Aviv faces a "complex
equation," eight months after the war launched by the United States and Israel
against Iran last February, as Tehran gradually restores part of its military
capabilities, and its nuclear file remains unresolved, while there are no clear
indications that Washington is prepared to enter a new confrontation.
According to a report published by the Authority, Iran suffered major damage
during the war, but its regime remains in place, while it has begun working to
repair its damaged military sites, raising Israeli fears of a restoration of its
capabilities and a decline in coordination with the United States.
The Authority noted that US President Donald Trump prefers to avoid engaging in
a new military confrontation, at a time when fears are growing inside Israel
that it may find itself forced to act alone if Tehran continues to rebuild its
capabilities. The US and Israeli strikes during the war targeted the Iranian
nuclear program and missile production facilities, but rehabilitation work on
the damaged sites has already begun, amid continued questions about the fate of
the enriched uranium stockpile and how long Iran might need to reach production
of a nuclear weapon. In this context, Iran affairs expert Tamar Eilam Gindin saw
a clear contradiction between the Israeli statements that followed the war and
the current warnings, saying: "First we hear that we destroyed their nuclear
capabilities for years, then less than a year later we hear that we face an
existential danger again because they possess these capabilities." Israeli fears
are not limited to the nuclear program, as Iran still retains missile
capabilities, while Sima Shine, former official in the Israeli intelligence
agency Mossad, warned that the war strengthened Iran's motivation to possess
nuclear weapons, after it exposed Tehran's weaknesses in the face of military
attacks. Shine pointed to the possibility of Iran moving toward establishing new
military and nuclear facilities deep underground, making them more difficult and
complex to target in any future confrontation. In contrast, the Iranian
leadership is adopting a more hardline rhetoric regarding its nuclear program,
amid internal divergence between a current pushing toward escalation, and
another that sees the need to invest what it considers a victory in the war to
reach an agreement with Washington.
Eilam Gindin said that the Iranian regime views itself as victorious in the war,
noting that one of the most prominent repercussions was a decline in Tehran's
fears of entering a military confrontation.
Despite the damage inflicted on Iran and the deterioration of its economic
situation, Israeli expectations of widespread protests that would threaten the
regime and topple it did not materialize. Eilam Gindin believes that Iranians
may need external assistance to confront the regime's repressive tools. Israel
continues to pressure the Trump administration to resume military operations
against Iran, at a time when Washington appears less enthusiastic about a new
war, preferring to focus on resolving the nuclear file and avoiding the
repercussions of a regional confrontation that could affect shipping security
and energy supplies.
The disagreement between the two sides is not limited to the timing of any
potential military action, but extends to the desired objectives. While Trump
seeks to resolve the nuclear file, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
sees changing the Iranian regime as the way to end the threat Tehran poses to
Israel. In this context, Yaki Dayan, an expert in Israeli-American relations and
former Israeli consul in Los Angeles, said that the survival of the Iranian
regime means the continuation of the motive behind threatening Israel,
considering that this reveals the widening gap between Washington and Tel Aviv
on how to deal with Tehran. These disagreements raise questions about Israel's
readiness to enter a new military confrontation without US participation, if its
efforts to convince the Trump administration to return to the military option
falter. Dayan believes that carrying out a military operation within the next
two years will be relatively easier as long as Trump is in power, but he warned
at the same time of the possibility that Israel may be forced to enter a
confrontation alone. In contrast, Shine warned that Israel entering an
independent war against Iran, without US support, and even with the possibility
of Washington opposing it, would be "suicide" for it. 3 Scenarios on the Table..
How Is the Israeli Army Preparing for the Next Phase Amid the Fragile Truce with
Tehran?
Military and intelligence movements in Israel are accelerating amid escalating
regional tension with Iran, at a politically sensitive moment Tel Aviv is going
through after the Knesset elections and efforts to form a new government headed
by the designate Gadi Eisenkot. While the Israeli army raises its readiness
level, putting forward 3 scenarios to deal with the next phase, the
behind-the-scenes of Israeli decision-making reveal an unprecedented split
between the political level and the security agencies on one side, and Chief of
Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir on the other, in parallel with a secret visit by
Mossad director Roman Gofman to the United States to rally US support for
resuming military operations, amid warnings from the opposition about dragging
the country into a war aimed at obstructing the transfer of power.
The Three Scenarios on the Israeli Army's Table and the
Missile Arms Race
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Israel's Channel 13 reported that the military establishment has put forward 3
possible paths for dealing with Iran, based on recent intelligence estimates
indicating Tehran's success in producing about 50 surface-to-surface missiles
per month, an increase of about 20% compared to its previous rates, reflecting
its continued efforts to restore its missile capabilities after the joint war
launched by Washington and Tel Aviv on February 28 and which entered a fragile
truce phase in April.
The Israeli scenarios are distributed as follows:
Scenario One (Large-scale Iranian attack): Iran initiates a planned attack
against Israel and US bases in the Middle East, prompting the Israeli Air Force
to activate immediate response plans in direct coordination with US Central
Command "CENTCOM," amid Israeli hopes for broad US military participation in
combat operations.
Scenario Two (Joint military campaign – the army's preferred option): Based on
US President Donald Trump deciding to launch a joint US-Israeli air campaign, if
the diplomatic track falters. According to the report, this campaign could last
days or weeks, targeting missile sites, drones, and Iranian nuclear facilities,
in addition to striking infrastructure to inflict severe damage on the Iranian
economy and energy sector, with the Israeli army remaining largely dependent on
US aerial refueling capabilities to succeed in any long-range operation.
Scenario Three (Political agreement): Reaching a diplomatic settlement between
Washington and Tehran that allows Trump to declare he has achieved his goals and
end the confrontation. Despite Israeli reservations about its security
implications, the channel indicated that Tel Aviv is dealing with this track
with cautious positivity, at a time when the US President currently prefers a
maximum pressure strategy via sanctions and naval blockade, while keeping the
military force option on the table when necessary.
In parallel with the military estimates, Axios and Haaretz revealed that Israeli
Mossad director Roman Gofman arrived in Washington on Friday on an unannounced
mission, and held a meeting with his counterpart, CIA Director John Ratcliffe,
in preparation for moving to Miami to meet White House envoy Steve Witkoff.
According to informed sources, Gofman carries, on assignment from caretaker
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, intelligence files on the Iranian nuclear
program and development of long-range missiles, and claims of Tehran violating
existing understandings with Washington, as part of Netanyahu's persistent
efforts to convince the Trump administration to return to the military option,
and to dispel Israeli fears of concluding a US-Iranian deal that eases pressure
on Tehran without dismantling its strategic capabilities.
Domestically, the file of directing a military strike at Iran has sparked a
notable divergence within decision-making circles in Tel Aviv. Israel's Channel
12 revealed that Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir has become the only security
official opposing an immediate Israeli attack on Iran, in contrast to a
pro-escalation front comprising Netanyahu, Mossad director Roman Gofman, Shin
Bet chief David Zini, National Security Council head Shmuel Ben Ezra, and
Israeli ambassador to Washington Yechiel Leiter. Zamir's vision, according to
what Channel 12 and the Israeli Broadcasting Authority "Kan" reported, is based
on Iran representing a real threat but not an urgent one to the point of
necessitating being dragged into a "long war of attrition" in a political
transitional phase without clear objectives. Zamir believes priority should be
given to achieving internal political stability and forming the new government,
stressing that if Israel is forced to wage war against Iran in the future, it
must be a decisive campaign aimed at toppling the regime, not just a round of
attrition.
In the same context, Hebrew media revealed that Netanyahu did not inform Yesh
Atid leader and government formation designate Gadi Eisenkot of the Mossad
chief's secret visit to Washington during the security briefing session that
brought them together on Thursday, and failed to convince him of the need for an
immediate attack. After the meeting, Eisenkot issued a strong public warning,
calling for imposing "strict oversight" on the caretaker government to prevent
any attempt to achieve "political gains" or obstruct the formation of the new
government at the expense of Israel's security, and demanding Netanyahu not
place security agency leaders in front of a complex constitutional conflict.
18 Arab and Islamic Countries Escalate Their Stance Against
Israel.. Warnings of Ceasefire Collapse and Calls to Open Gaza Crossings
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
18 Arab and Islamic countries condemned the continued Israeli attacks on
Palestinian civilians and displaced persons' tents in the Gaza Strip,
considering them to undermine the ceasefire agreement and threaten efforts to
consolidate calm, while calling on the United States and the "Peace Council" to
pressure Israel to ensure implementation of its commitments, in parallel with a
European demand to open the crossings for aid and relief organizations to
confront the repercussions of floods hitting the Strip. In a statement issued
today, Saturday, the 18 countries denounced the continued Israeli attacks on
Palestinian civilians, including targeting displaced persons' tents and sites
sheltering them, considering these attacks a violation of international law and
undermining efforts to restore security and stability in Gaza. The statement
condemned in the strongest terms the Israeli air raid that targeted the Nasser
Medical Complex in Khan Younis, which resulted in victims among patients and
medical staff. The countries confirmed that targeting health facilities and
their workers constitutes a violation of international humanitarian law, which
grants hospitals and medical staff special protection, and obliges parties to
the conflict to respect them and not expose them to attacks. The countries
considered that the continued Israeli attacks contradict the ceasefire
agreement, and threaten efforts to restore stability in the Strip, in addition
to contradicting the comprehensive plan put forward by US President Donald
Trump. The statement expressed deep concern over the continued Israeli
restrictions on the entry of humanitarian aid and shelter materials, including
tents, caravans, and mobile homes, along with medical supplies, warning that
these restrictions exacerbate the humanitarian catastrophe, especially with the
approach of winter and increasing suffering of the displaced.
The countries stressed the need for Israel's commitment to the ceasefire,
protecting civilians and medical facilities, and ensuring the entry of
humanitarian aid in sufficient quantities and in a safe, sustainable, and
unimpeded manner, including shelter supplies, early recovery, and rehabilitation
of basic infrastructure. They also called for allowing UN agencies and
humanitarian organizations to carry out their tasks and deliver aid without
restrictions. In a position reflecting escalating diplomatic pressure, the 18
countries called on the United States and the "Peace Council" to intensify their
efforts to ensure Israel implements its commitments in full, and to lift
restrictions imposed on the entry of humanitarian aid, in a way that preserves
the credibility of the understandings and enhances the continuity of the
ceasefire.
They demanded Israel respond to the appeals of the international community and
the Peace Council, increase the flow of aid to the Strip, and fulfill
immediately and fully its obligations under the Sharm El-Sheikh agreement,
Trump's comprehensive plan, and UN Security Council Resolution 2803 of 2025.
The countries confirmed their determination to continue coordination with
regional and international partners to consolidate the ceasefire, implement all
phases of the US plan, and expand the scope of humanitarian aid to alleviate the
suffering of Palestinians.
In a related context, the European Union urged Israel today, Saturday, to allow
relief organizations to enter the Gaza Strip, and enable them to help residents
affected by floods hitting wide areas of the Strip. The Union said, in a
statement, that it urges Israel to allow the entry of humanitarian aid and early
recovery supplies immediately and without obstacles, and ensure their wide
distribution, in addition to reopening all border crossings leading to Gaza. The
European demands come amid worsening humanitarian conditions, with displaced
persons' tents and shelter centers damaged by weather conditions and floods,
amid a severe shortage of relief and shelter supplies. On the human losses
front, the data included in the report indicated that Israeli forces killed
2,021 Palestinians and injured 3,249 others since the ceasefire agreement
entered into force, due to daily violations that included bombing and shooting.
The agreement came after a devastating Israeli war on the Gaza Strip that began
on October 7, 2023, and lasted two years, leaving more than 73,000 martyrs and
more than 173,000 wounded, in addition to destruction affecting about 90% of
civilian infrastructure, according to the figures in the report. The United
Nations estimates the cost of rebuilding the Strip at about $70 billion, at a
time when humanitarian and relief needs are still increasing, amid continued
restrictions on the entry of aid and reconstruction materials.
Raiding 20 Homes and Carving a Military Path Toward the
Yarmouk Basin.. Continued Israeli Field Escalation in Southern Syria and
Detention of 49 Civilians
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Israeli occupation forces continue their field escalation and repeated
violations in southern Syria; a military force carried out a new incursion in
the northern Quneitra countryside, involving raids, vandalism, and temporary
arrests, in parallel with excavation and bulldozing work to carve a new military
path in the western Daraa countryside. These field developments come at a time
when popular anger is escalating in border villages demanding the release of
Syrian detainees in occupation prisons, and amid diplomatic moves and official
and UN statistics revealing the extent of continued Israeli violations of the
disengagement agreement.On the ground, Israeli occupation forces penetrated with
more than 10 military vehicles into the village of Jbata al-Khashab in the
northern Quneitra countryside, where they carried out, last night, a wide raid
and search campaign affecting more than 20 homes, involving breaking home
furniture and tampering with their contents, according to what the correspondent
of "Syria Now" reported. The correspondent explained that the infiltrating force
detained 3 people from the village's residents, before releasing two of them the
same night, and releasing the third person this morning. This move falls within
a series of successive violations witnessed in the border area; occupation
forces had released, yesterday, two young men they had kidnapped at a temporary
checkpoint they set up between the town of Jbata al-Khashab and the village of
Ain al-Bayda, a day after targeting the outskirts of the village of Bariqa in
the central Quneitra countryside with 4 artillery shells.In parallel, occupation
vehicles carried out, yesterday Friday, excavation and bulldozing work to carve
a new road and path in the western Daraa countryside, extending from the Sihan
Observatory in the occupied Syrian Golan toward Wadi al-Raqad near the village
of Abdin in the Yarmouk Basin area, amid mobilization and continued military
movements adjacent to the border strip. In parallel with the military
escalation, popular movements demanding the release of Syrian detainees held by
the Israeli occupation are escalating. In this context, dozens of residents from
the governorates of Quneitra, Daraa, and Damascus countryside carried out,
yesterday Friday, a large protest vigil in front of the headquarters of the
United Nations Disengagement Observer Force "UNDOF" in the village of Nabaa al-Fawar
in the northern Quneitra countryside, demanding the international organization
take urgent action to reveal the fate of their sons and pressure for their
release. Politically and legally, Syrian Justice Minister Dr. Mazhar al-Wais
revealed, during the second session of the Council of Arab Justice Ministers
last Thursday, official figures documenting the implementation by occupation
forces of more than 2,427 violations inside Syrian territory since the beginning
of this year, including ground incursions, raids, and arbitrary detention
operations. For its part, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented
about 280 Israeli incursions into Syria during the month of September alone,
confirming the continued detention of at least 49 Syrian citizens in occupation
prisons. This comes at a time when Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani renewed,
on October 31, Damascus's strong condemnation of repeated Israeli attacks on
Syrian sovereignty, demanding the necessity of withdrawal of occupation forces
and a return to the lines before December 8, 2024, and activation of the
"Disengagement Agreement" signed in 1974.
Trump Between Riyadh and Ankara Pressures and Israeli
Threats.. Will Escalation with Iran Be Avoided?
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
US President Donald Trump is leaning toward avoiding resuming military attacks
on Iran, unless Tehran or its allied Houthi group in Yemen undertakes new
provocations, despite continued US military preparations for possible
escalation, according to what Reuters quoted from three sources familiar with
discussions inside the US administration. According to the sources, Trump told
his senior advisers, during the past days, that he is considering not launching
new military strikes, following meetings with national security advisers and
intelligence briefings addressing the repercussions of continuing the war and
the options available to Washington in the next phase. In a White House
statement, an official confirmed that Trump, as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed
Forces, is the final decision-maker regarding US military movements, stressing
that he will work to protect US interests. He added that the United States
enjoys a strong position, based on its control of the Strait of Hormuz and what
he described as the collapse of the Iranian economy, noting that the President
alone knows the nature of the steps he will take and their timing. According to
Reuters, Trump's position has swung between threatening to expand the war by
launching new strikes, and moving toward reducing military operations, at a time
when current and former officials still see that he has not yet decided how to
end the war that is unpopular inside the United States, and which Washington
began in coordination with Israel last February.
In the context of diplomatic moves, sources revealed that Trump requested,
during phone calls he made in the past two weeks, the views of Saudi Crown
Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on
escalation with Iran, where the two leaders urged him not to resume attacks,
without the US President giving a clear commitment in this direction.
Informed sources explained that Trump informed the Saudi Crown Prince, during a
call on October 31, of his intention to launch an attack on Iran after the
elections, but Prince Mohammed bin Salman called on him to back down from this
step, considering that the economic sanctions imposed on Tehran have begun to
achieve their results. In the same context, the Turkish presidency said that
Trump held three phone calls with Erdogan since October 28, while an official
statement regarding a call on November 7 stressed the necessity of ending the
state of tension between Iran and the United States.On the intelligence level,
two informed US officials said that intelligence assessments concluded that the
US naval blockade and economic sanctions have inflicted damage on the Iranian
economy, and that continuing these measures would keep pressure on Tehran.
Reuters had previously reported that the US military is working, as part of its
efforts to limit Iranian maritime navigation, to prevent the arrival of weapons
and sanctioned materials to Iran, whether via land routes or through the Caspian
Sea. These assessments reinforce a trend within the US administration that sees
continuing economic pressure may be more effective than returning to military
confrontation, especially amid unclear results that additional strikes could
achieve.
Despite talk of avoiding escalation, Washington still keeps its military options
open, as three sources familiar with US military planning confirmed that the
army is preparing for the possibility of expanding operations when necessary.
The sources indicated that a third aircraft carrier will head to the Middle East
in the coming days, to replace one of the two aircraft carriers currently in the
region, with the possibility of keeping all three carriers in the region if
developments require it. In this context, one of those familiar with the
communications between Trump and the Saudi and Turkish leaders pointed to the
possibility of the US President resorting to targeting underground Iranian
nuclear facilities. But the United States had previously bombed these
facilities, raising questions about the ability of any additional strikes to
achieve different results or bring about a fundamental change in the course of
the confrontation.
In parallel with military preparations, intelligence briefings Trump received
revealed a decline in some US weapons stockpiles to levels described as
concerning. Reuters had reported in August that the United States had used
"almost all" of its long-range precision munitions, while another informed
source indicated that Washington had not worked to replenish those stockpiles.
In response to this data, a White House official confirmed that the US military
possesses enough equipment and munitions to achieve all strategic objectives of
the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, and more.In contrast, an American
official indicated that Israeli officials continue to pressure the US
administration to engage in a new military campaign against Iran, amid continued
disagreement over the most effective options for dealing with Tehran. These data
place the Trump administration before divergent options, between continuing the
policy of economic pressure and naval blockade, or returning to direct military
confrontation, amid diplomatic pressure from Riyadh and Ankara, and Israeli
demands to renew military operations. While intelligence estimates indicate that
additional strikes may not bring about a fundamental change in the Iranian
position during negotiations, US military movements remain an indicator that the
escalation option has not been completely ruled out, and that Trump's final
decision remains open to more than one possibility.
Iranian Plot to Target the US President?
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
A report by the newspaper Israel Hayom, quoting high-level Israeli and American
officials, revealed that the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad transferred to
the US Central Intelligence Agency "CIA" specific intelligence information
regarding a potential Iranian plot to target US President Donald Trump and
senior officials of his administration using a drone. According to the report,
this step came after US intelligence agencies asked Mossad to verify information
related to the threat, prompting the Israeli agency to transfer intelligence
data described by the report as specific to the American side. The report added
that the information led to a series of precautionary measures, including
transferring senior US officials to secure facilities, reducing President
Trump's public appearances, in addition to strengthening security measures
surrounding him and senior officials of his administration.
This information comes amid escalating tension between Washington and Tehran,
and growing security fears of the possibility of the confrontation moving to
targeting high-level political and security figures, while the report did not
include independent official American confirmation of the existence of an actual
Iranian plot to target Trump.
After the Iran War.. Israeli Fears of an Uncalculated
Surprise
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
The Israeli Broadcasting Authority said that Tel Aviv faces a "complex
equation," eight months after the war launched by the United States and Israel
against Iran last February, as Tehran gradually restores part of its military
capabilities, and its nuclear file remains unresolved, while there are no clear
indications that Washington is prepared to enter a new confrontation. According
to a report published by the Authority, Iran suffered major damage during the
war, but its regime remains in place, while it has begun working to repair its
damaged military sites, raising Israeli fears of a restoration of its
capabilities and a decline in coordination with the United States. The Authority
noted that US President Donald Trump prefers to avoid engaging in a new military
confrontation, at a time when fears are growing inside Israel that it may find
itself forced to act alone if Tehran continues to rebuild its capabilities. The
US and Israeli strikes during the war targeted the Iranian nuclear program and
missile production facilities, but rehabilitation work on the damaged sites has
already begun, amid continued questions about the fate of the enriched uranium
stockpile and how long Iran might need to reach production of a nuclear weapon.
In this context, Iran affairs expert Tamar Eilam Gindin saw a clear
contradiction between the Israeli statements that followed the war and the
current warnings, saying: "First we hear that we destroyed their nuclear
capabilities for years, then less than a year later we hear that we face an
existential danger again because they possess these capabilities."Israeli fears
are not limited to the nuclear program, as Iran still retains missile
capabilities, while Sima Shine, former official in the Israeli intelligence
agency Mossad, warned that the war strengthened Iran's motivation to possess
nuclear weapons, after it exposed Tehran's weaknesses in the face of military
attacks. Shine pointed to the possibility of Iran moving toward establishing new
military and nuclear facilities deep underground, making them more difficult and
complex to target in any future confrontation.
In contrast, the Iranian leadership is adopting a more hardline rhetoric
regarding its nuclear program, amid internal divergence between a current
pushing toward escalation, and another that sees the need to invest what it
considers a victory in the war to reach an agreement with Washington.
Eilam Gindin said that the Iranian regime views itself as victorious in the war,
noting that one of the most prominent repercussions was a decline in Tehran's
fears of entering a military confrontation.
Despite the damage inflicted on Iran and the deterioration of its economic
situation, Israeli expectations of widespread protests that would threaten the
regime and topple it did not materialize. Eilam Gindin believes that Iranians
may need external assistance to confront the regime's repressive tools. Israel
continues to pressure the Trump administration to resume military operations
against Iran, at a time when Washington appears less enthusiastic about a new
war, preferring to focus on resolving the nuclear file and avoiding the
repercussions of a regional confrontation that could affect shipping security
and energy supplies. The disagreement between the two sides is not limited to
the timing of any potential military action, but extends to the desired
objectives. While Trump seeks to resolve the nuclear file, Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sees changing the Iranian regime as the way to end
the threat Tehran poses to Israel. In this context, Yaki Dayan, an expert in
Israeli-American relations and former Israeli consul in Los Angeles, said that
the survival of the Iranian regime means the continuation of the motive behind
threatening Israel, considering that this reveals the widening gap between
Washington and Tel Aviv on how to deal with Tehran. These disagreements raise
questions about Israel's readiness to enter a new military confrontation without
US participation, if its efforts to convince the Trump administration to return
to the military option falter. Dayan believes that carrying out a military
operation within the next two years will be relatively easier as long as Trump
is in power, but he warned at the same time of the possibility that Israel may
be forced to enter a confrontation alone. In contrast, Shine warned that Israel
entering an independent war against Iran, without US support, and even with the
possibility of Washington opposing it, would be "suicide" for it.
3 Scenarios on the Table.. How Is the Israeli Army Preparing for the Next Phase
Amid the Fragile Truce with Tehran?
Military and intelligence movements in Israel are accelerating amid escalating
regional tension with Iran, at a politically sensitive moment Tel Aviv is going
through after the Knesset elections and efforts to form a new government headed
by the designate Gadi Eisenkot. While the Israeli army raises its readiness
level, putting forward 3 scenarios to deal with the next phase, the
behind-the-scenes of Israeli decision-making reveal an unprecedented split
between the political level and the security agencies on one side, and Chief of
Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir on the other, in parallel with a secret visit by
Mossad director Roman Gofman to the United States to rally US support for
resuming military operations, amid warnings from the opposition about dragging
the country into a war aimed at obstructing the transfer of power.
Thousands of US Flights Canceled and Delayed Despite Resumption of Travel...
Operations Expected to Return Largely to Normal by End of Sunday
Reuters/November 14, 2026
Major airlines canceled more than 4,500 flights in the United States today,
Saturday, and delayed more than 4,400 others, as the United States seeks to
recover from the longest nationwide flight stoppage since the September 11, 2001
attacks. Federal Aviation Administration Administrator Bryan Bedford apologized
for the disruption, noting that the system has become stable and that he expects
airline operations to return largely to normal by the end of tomorrow, Sunday.
The Administration issued a nationwide ground stop order yesterday, Friday,
which led to a halt of almost all departing flights for about five hours. That
forced airlines to cancel nearly 10,000 flights and delay more than 7,000 in one
of the worst travel days in US history. This problem prompted the White House to
hold an emergency meeting in the Situation Room yesterday, and federal agencies
began intensive efforts to determine whether it involved a cyberattack.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said today that the installation by
L3Harris, the FAA contractor, of at least one new router at a remote facility is
what caused this disruption. He added at a press conference: "We are working to
determine whether it was incompetence, i.e., was it user error or error by the
L3Harris installer, or did they install a defective router? We have not yet
determined what caused the malfunction."
L3Harris has not yet responded to a request for comment. Its shares fell about
four percent in latest after-market trading yesterday. The malfunction
overloaded other communications centers with data. Duffy said: "We were
receiving more than a thousand connection attempts every four to five seconds,
which caused problems in our communications with aircraft, and also caused some
disruptions in our radar operations." The problem affected communications in 17
of the 22 aviation centers across the country, which are FAA facilities that
control aircraft during the normal flight phase of a trip. Bedford said the
Administration ordered a ground stop from airports in anticipation of losing one
of the communications centers entirely. Bedford added: "No facility stopped
working. And we did not lose anything completely." The Administration said it is
conducting additional tests with L3Harris to see if there are any additional
risks. United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and American Airlines canceled about
20% of their flights today, while JetBlue canceled 40%. Airlines issued waivers
allowing passengers to rebook for later dates at no cost. Although the FAA
eventually lifted the ground stop order last night, the disruptions facing
passengers have not yet ended, as tens of thousands of them remain stranded at
airports across the country. Airlines are trying to reduce congestion at
airports and prepare flight crews and other staff to resume work after this
massive disruption.
Two airline officials said the FAA issued the ground stop order because of a
malfunction that appeared to affect a network that manages critical radio
frequencies used by air traffic controllers to communicate with pilots. L3Harris
oversees the network. The problem that occurred yesterday is the latest and
clearest sign of the pressures on the US air traffic control system, which
suffers from problems in technology, equipment, and communications due to aging,
as well as a shortage of several thousand air traffic controllers. The
Transportation Secretary yesterday called for $50 billion in funding to
modernize air traffic control systems, an increase over the $30 billion he had
requested earlier. He said: "This is an emergency." Duffy explained that the
problem began yesterday afternoon when air traffic control centers experienced
disruptions in radar and communications systems. Since the Administration is
responsible for passenger delays, airlines are not obligated to provide
compensation. Since the September 11 attacks, the only other nationwide ground
stop occurred in January 2023, when the Administration stopped domestic flights
for about 90 minutes, disrupting nearly 11,000 flights.
US Embassy Warns of Escalation in Saudi Arabia.. Houthis
and Iran in the Circle of Concern
Janoubia / November 14, 2026
The US Embassy in Riyadh raised the level of security warnings for its citizens
in Saudi Arabia and the Middle East region, calling for caution and taking
necessary precautions, amid fears of escalating armed attacks that the Houthis
may launch, alongside potential Iranian threats targeting US government
officials in the region. The Embassy, in a statement, asked US citizens to
review the US State Department's travel warning regarding Saudi Arabia, and to
review the latest security information and travel-related guidance, stressing
the importance of taking preventive measures in light of security developments.
The statement noted that the Houthis had previously carried out attacks and
hostile acts against Saudi Arabia, affecting civilian airports and vital
facilities, resulting in civilian casualties, as well as causing widespread
disruptions in travel movement. The Embassy warned of the possibility of these
attacks escalating at a rapid pace, and the scope of their repercussions
expanding to include areas beyond the directly targeted sites, calling on US
citizens to follow official security guidance and remain highly vigilant. These
warnings come amid US fears of widening security threats in the Middle East,
especially potential attacks on Saudi territory, alongside what the Embassy
statement referred to regarding Iran's efforts to target US government officials
in the region. These measures reflect escalating US concern about the
possibility of deteriorating security conditions, and what that could entail for
the safety of US citizens and travel movement in the region.
US Transportation Secretary Reveals Cause of Technical Malfunction and Warns
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Air traffic in the United States gradually returned to normal, after a
widespread stoppage witnessed by US airports on Friday, following a technical
malfunction that affected communications with aircraft, disrupted travel
movement, and caused delays and cancellation of a number of flights. Despite the
resumption of operations, the repercussions of the malfunction continue, amid
warnings that some delays and cancellations will remain in the coming days,
until flight schedules regain regularity. US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy
confirmed, Saturday, the return of air operations, explaining that air traffic
began gradually regaining its regularity, while airlines continue to reschedule
a number of flights to deal with remaining repercussions. Duffy explained,
during a press conference, that the malfunction resulted from a technical
problem that affected communication with aircraft, noting that the competent
authorities worked to isolate the source of the malfunction. He denied that what
happened was caused by a cyberattack. He pointed out that the Department of
Transportation had previously asked Congress to provide the necessary funding to
update the communications network used in US airports. In a related context,
Duffy warned of the aging of technical equipment used in the air navigation
sector, noting that a number of control towers still rely on devices that are
several decades old. He added that he had asked President Donald Trump, since
taking office, to work on updating air navigation devices, considering that the
time has come to develop these systems, and calling on Congress to expedite
approval of the required funding. The flight stoppage caused confusion in
airports across the United States, where some passengers were deplaned before
takeoff, while airline staff faced difficulty in providing clear explanations
for what happened. This stoppage is the second time flights have been suspended
in the United States since the September 11 attacks, while the Transportation
Secretary and the White House, on Friday, requested $30.1 billion to develop old
airports and update the air traffic control system. In July 2025, Congress
approved allocating $12.5 billion over five years, to update the air traffic
control system and increase the number of air traffic controllers, amid growing
complaints of airport congestion, flight delays, and technical problems. The US
Federal Aviation Administration still relies on computers some of which are
decades old, as well as using spare parts purchased from auction sites. The
Administration had announced last week that it intends to replace the floppy
disks used to transfer weather information and other vital data, in more than
400 air traffic control facilities, by the end of 2028. The US aviation sector
had previously witnessed similar technical disruptions. Last September, a double
malfunction in an electrical circuit inside an air traffic control facility in
Philadelphia, coinciding with a fiber optic cable cut in New Jersey by a
construction team, caused delays or cancellations of thousands of flights in
densely populated northeastern United States. These incidents highlight the
challenges facing US air navigation infrastructure, and the need to update
technical systems to avoid repetition of disruptions.
US air travel resumption will 'take time' after
hours-long stop
Agence France Presse/November 14, 2026
Flights in the United States were resuming on Saturday after being grounded for
several hours due to a major communications outage, though authorities said
returning to normal operations would take time. The nationwide stop on Friday
sparked widespread chaos and left hundreds of thousands of passengers in limbo,
with some pulled off planes moments before departure by airline staff who
appeared in the dark about unfolding events. The incident marked only the second
time such an alert had been issued in U.S. airspace -- which is among the
busiest in the world -- since the 9/11 attacks.
The ground stop lasted around four hours and was lifted at 8:15 pm Eastern Time
(0115 GMT Saturday). Federal Aviation Administration officials reopened the
airspace on Friday night "after restoring full functionality" at air traffic
control facilities, according to Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy. "It
will take us time (to) resume normal operations... Our top priority is the
safety of you and your family when you fly," Duffy said. Administration
officials blamed the incident on telecommunications issues with decades-old
equipment, adding there was no evidence of foul play.
"This is a legacy system problem," Duffy said. "We have old, old switches, old
routers."We use 1980s little copper lines. It's an old system that went down,
and went down everywhere. It got overloaded."Duffy had formally asked Congress
on Thursday for $30.1 billion in funds to upgrade and modernize the air traffic
control System. As the ground stop was lifted, he repeated his plea."I'm going
to say it a million times: the Congress has to give the resources to the
president so he can finish this bill," he said.
6,000 flights canceled -
There were almost 6,000 flights canceled, including some international routes,
according to FlightAware, a tracking platform. Footage from airports around the
country showed gates full, with planes waiting on taxiways. Passengers thronged
concourses, desperate for information about an outage that had thrown their
plans into chaos. "We're trying to debate whether or not we need to reschedule
or drive or what, but if the whole country is stopped, that means the highways
are going to be jammed too," said Joseph Anderson, 72, who was trying to fly
from Las Vegas to Oakland, California.
A nationwide ground stop is highly unusual. There was
one such stop in January 2023 when a pilot notification system failed, but the
only other national stop happened in the wake of the 9/11 attacks in September
2001, when no aircraft took to the skies for days.Homeland Security Secretary
Markwayne Mullin stressed there was no evidence of any hostile action on Friday.
"We've seen zero evidence that this was a cyberattack or (AI) attack," he told a
news conference. He also ruled out any connection with the outage that affected
Microsoft this week, knocking email systems offline for millions of users,
public services and businesses worldwide.
Confusion and delays -
The stop caused misery at airports around the country. At New York's LaGuardia
Airport, Tiara Johnson said she had been trying to get to Orlando for a concert
with a friend. "They just keep delaying it... So it
started out at 7:55. Then it went to 8:30, 9:30. Now it's at 10:30. So we don't
know when it's gonna leave," she told AFP. "I feel very frustrated because you
know, you come to the airport and then all of a sudden your whole plans have
changed and you don't know when you're leaving. We're kind of stuck." Some
travelers said they had been told their flight was delayed because of wind,
while others were left to gather what information they could.
Boards at the airport continued to show departures leaving as normal,
while mobile boarding passes held by those stuck on the ground appeared to show
their flight was underway. Stranded passengers were
scrambling to find alternatives, with long lines forming at rental car counters
at the airport in Las Vegas. Susan Sardina said she had boarded her flight back
to Orange County, California when staff told passengers there was a problem. "We
were already on our flight to leave and we were told to get off," she told AFP
as she stood in a lengthy queue for a rental car.
For those looking on the bright side, the delay was a chance to extend a
break.Kathy Sommers was on her way home from visiting friends in Las Vegas when
her flight got canceled."We're blessed that our friends are coming back to pick
us up," she said. "So one more night to play cards."
After Widespread Paralysis in US Airports... When Will Flight Chaos End?
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Air traffic in the United States began gradually regaining its activity,
following widespread paralysis that hit flights due to a malfunction in the
communications network and air traffic control systems of the Federal Aviation
Administration, but the return of operations did not end the repercussions of
the crisis, as airlines still face a wave of cancellations, delays, and
rescheduling of thousands of flights, amid expectations that disruptions will
continue for days. US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said air traffic began
gradually returning to normal, warning that travelers will continue to face
delays, cancellations, and changes in flight times, while authorities work in
coordination with airlines to accelerate the restoration of operational
operations. The Federal Aviation Administration had imposed a widespread ground
stop of aircraft from US airports, after the communications network used in air
traffic control centers suffered a malfunction that affected the regularity of
data exchange and communications between controllers and aircraft. The
disruption led to the cancellation of more than 6,300 flights and delay of more
than 9,500 others, according to a tally reported by US media reports, while the
number of canceled flights exceeded 8,000 by 8:30 p.m., according to data
reported by the Financial Times. More than 1.5 million people were scheduled to
travel on about 11,000 flights from US airports after 4 p.m. Eastern Time,
according to data from aviation information company Cirium, reflecting the scale
of the impact on air transport movement. US authorities have not yet announced a
final financial tally of losses resulting from the stoppage, nor have they
issued separate estimates of damages incurred by airlines. Duffy explained that
assessing the economic impact of the crisis needs more time. The cost is not
limited to canceled flights, but extends to rebooking expenses and ticket
refunds, reorganizing aircraft and crew schedules, in addition to additional
fuel consumption due to rerouting some flights, and accommodation costs for
affected travelers when needed. Companies also face challenges in redistributing
aircraft and crews between airports, as a delay of one flight can reflect on a
series of subsequent flights linked to the same aircraft or its crew,
multiplying the effects of the crisis even after systems return to operation.
Operational estimates indicate that restoring usual schedules may take days,
given the need to return aircraft to their scheduled locations, organize pilot
and cabin crew schedules, and address the backlog of travelers at airports.
US authorities attributed the malfunction to aging communications network
infrastructure, as Duffy explained that the system still relies on converters,
routers, and copper lines dating back to the 1980s, which were subjected to
great pressure leading to disruption of data and communications movement. He
added that the malfunction was not caused by sabotage, while the competent
authorities have not definitively ruled out all possibilities of external
intervention, pending completion of security and technical assessments. The
Transportation Secretary revealed that modern systems that were deployed were
not affected by the same malfunction, and that the malfunction was concentrated
in old equipment, noting that repairing the network and restarting it allowed
gradual resumption of air traffic. The crisis coincided with the Trump
administration's move to request additional funding from Congress of nearly $30
billion, to complete updating the air traffic control system and airport
infrastructure. Congress had approved last year allocating $12.5 billion for the
update project, while the Department of Transportation sees that completing it
requires additional funding to develop communications networks, radars, and old
technical systems. The crisis highlighted the challenges facing the US aviation
sector, especially the risks of relying on old communications infrastructure
amid continued growth in air traffic and increasing pressure on air traffic
control systems. This incident is the second that the United States has
witnessed a widespread national disruption in air traffic since the September
11, 2001 attacks, after the malfunction that hit the air notification system (NOTAM)
in January 2023, which led at the time to delaying thousands of flights and
canceling more than 1,300 flights. While aircraft gradually regain their routes
in US skies, airlines remain faced with the challenge of reorganizing their
operations and addressing the backlog of flights, while travelers remain exposed
to further delays and cancellations in the coming days.
Between Military Moves and Energy Security.. New US-Iranian
Escalation and Strait of Hormuz in the Forefront
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Amid escalating tensions between the United States and Iran, and growing
security concerns in the Gulf region and the Strait of Hormuz, new developments
emerged on the military and political levels, after US Central Command revealed
figures related to oil movement through the Strait, in parallel with escalation
of Iranian rhetoric toward statements and threats issued by US officials. In
detail, US Central Command announced, Saturday, that more than 1.7 billion
barrels of oil were transported through the Strait of Hormuz by Washington's
Gulf partners, in a figure reflecting the strategic importance of this vital
maritime corridor, which constitutes one of the most prominent arteries of
global energy supplies. Central Command added that US F-16 fighter jets are
conducting air patrols over territorial waters in the Middle East region, in an
indicator of continued US military presence in the region, in parallel with
escalating tensions and fears of widening confrontation. This comes at a time
when the Strait of Hormuz is witnessing successive security developments, amid
incidents of targeting oil tankers in recent months, which revived fears about
the security of commercial navigation and safety of global energy supplies
through one of the most important strategic waterways in the world. On a
parallel track, the severity of tension moved to the political and media
confrontation, after Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Ismail Baghaei responded
to threats and statements issued by US officials toward the Iranian people,
describing them as "brazen," and carrying a clear threat to inflict famine on
Iranians. Iranian news agency Tasnim quoted Baghaei as saying that the statement
by the US Secretary of State, in which he indicated that they (Iranians) "will
eventually have to eat," represents an explicit threat to impose famine on the
Iranian people, considering that such statements reveal the nature of the US
approach toward Tehran. He added that these statements represent, in his
description, only a new admission of the United States' intention to commit war
crimes, placing them in the context of what he considered a US record full of
violations during previous wars, alongside what he described as continuous
economic terrorism practiced against peoples. In additional escalation, the
Iranian spokesman considered that the United States' continued use of the policy
of threats, sanctions, pressures, and aggression reflects what he described as
the "foolishness" of US leadership, confirming that Washington, despite decades
of these policies, has not made any fundamental change in its approach. Baghaei
pointed out that the United States still, in his expression, repeats the same
historical mistakes, merely re-presenting its previous policies under new names
and slogans, without a real review of its method of dealing with countries and
peoples. Between US military moves in the region's skies, and figures related to
oil flow through the Strait of Hormuz, and mutual verbal escalation between
Washington and Tehran, attention is turning to upcoming developments, amid fears
of the continued tension reflecting on navigation security, energy supplies, and
regional stability.
Blinken Warns of Catastrophic Military Option Against Iran... What Would Fully
Destroying Its Capabilities Require?
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Former US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned that fully destroying Iran's
military capabilities may require a ground intervention, considering that
resorting to this option would be "catastrophic by all measures," given the size
of Iran and the complexities of targeting its military facilities.
Blinken said, during his participation in the Indian Hindustan Times Leadership
Summit, that Iran's area is four times the area of the US state of California,
and three times the area of Iraq, while its population is about 90 million
people. He pointed out that the length of the Iranian coast overlooking the
Strait of Hormuz, and the spread of weapons production sites in distant areas
inside the country, increase the difficulty of targeting Iran's military
capabilities and eliminating them completely. He added that the range of weapons
Iran continues to produce allows it to reach distant targets, making the task of
comprehensively destroying its military arsenal more complex. Blinken continued:
"Achieving that may require carrying out some kind of ground invasion, which
would be a catastrophe by all measures," warning of the repercussions of such a
military option.
Iranian Navy: Three Tankers Caught Fire After Hitting Naval
Mines in Strait of Hormuz
Riyadh: Al Arabiya.net and agencies/November 14, 2026
State media quoted the Iranian Navy as saying that three oil tankers caught fire
today, Saturday, after hitting naval mines in the Strait of Hormuz. One tanker
was hit by a naval mine in the eastern Strait of Hormuz this morning, while two
other tankers hit mines later in the day.
The official Iranian news agency (IRNA) quoted the Revolutionary Guard Navy as
saying about the incident that occurred in the evening: "Two violating
tankers... were trying to infiltrate through a prohibited route in the Strait of
Hormuz when they hit naval mines and exploded and caught fire."
Reuters could not yet verify the accuracy of what was stated in the report. Iran
imposes restrictions on ships wishing to cross the Strait of Hormuz, and
launches attacks on ships it says violate these restrictions, as part of its
quest to impose its control over this strategic waterway and exert pressure on
the United States. Oil tankers continue to face attacks across the Strait
despite recovery of navigation movement and expectations of de-escalation in the
US-Israeli war on Iran, which in turn led to a drop in oil prices. According to
data from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, at least ten ships were
attacked during the first ten days of November, compared to 37 attacks in
October, which recorded the highest monthly number since the start of the war in
late February.
Oil Smuggling File in Jurf al-Nasr, Iraq Explodes.. Al-Zaidi
Refers Those Involved to Judiciary and Dismisses Security Leaders
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
In a notable development in the oil smuggling file in the Jurf al-Nasr area in
Babil Governorate, Prime Minister, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Ali
Faleh al-Zaidi, directed the referral of all accused involved in smuggling
operations to the judiciary, and decided to dismiss nine security and
administrative officials from their positions, following completion of
investigations that confirmed the existence of smuggling operations and oil
refineries and cases of manipulation in the file. Al-Zaidi chaired, today
Saturday, an emergency security meeting devoted to reviewing the results of the
report of the committee tasked with investigating the oil smuggling file in the
Jurf al-Nasr area. According to a statement by the spokesman for the
Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Sabah al-Numan, the committee presented
the results of its investigations, confirming the accuracy of the information
contained in the report of the Federal Intelligence and Investigations Agency
regarding oil smuggling operations, and the existence of oil refineries, in
addition to monitoring cases of manipulation in this file. In light of these
results, al-Zaidi directed the referral of all accused involved in oil smuggling
operations to the judiciary, and taking legal measures against them. The
decisions were not limited to referring the accused to the judiciary, as they
included dismissing nine security and administrative officials, they are:
Director of Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism of Babil in the Ministry of
Interior: Responsible for the intelligence and counter-terrorism file within the
Ministry's jurisdiction in the governorate. Director of Intelligence and
Security of Babil Governorate in the Ministry of Defense: Responsible for the
intelligence and security file within the formations of the Ministry of Defense.
Commander of the Sixth Brigade of the Energy Police in the Ministry of Interior:
Responsible for commanding the brigade tasked with protecting the energy sector.
Director of the Oil Pipelines Company in the Ministry of Oil: Responsible for
managing the company concerned with oil transport lines. In the context of the
measures, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces directed that operations
commanders and police commanders in the governorates, along with directors of
security and intelligence agencies, bear full responsibility for any oil
smuggling operations that occur within their areas of responsibility. He
stressed the need to tighten oversight and security measures to prevent these
practices and hold negligent persons accountable, stressing that there will not
remain an inch in Iraq where smuggling operations are practiced, from Zakho to
Basra. During the meeting, al-Zaidi praised the efforts of the investigative
committee in uncovering those involved in stealing public money, and determining
the circle of responsibility and diagnosing the negligent and those involved in
the crime of oil smuggling and pursuing them according to the law. He confirmed
that the government is committed to protecting public money and firmly
confronting oil smuggling operations, and thwarting all attempts to tamper with
national wealth in various parts of Iraq, stressing that security and
administrative responsibility imposes preventing these crimes and holding
accountable everyone whose negligence or involvement is proven.
This file brings back to light the issue of oil smuggling in Jurf al-Nasr, and
what was raised about it regarding the truth of the existence of sites used in
smuggling operations, and what the competent authorities reached during
follow-up and inspection operations. According to the results announced by the
investigative committee, the information related to the existence of smuggling
operations and oil refineries and cases of manipulation was confirmed, contrary
to what some previous information may have raised doubts about the existence of
evidence or sites related to the file. Thus, the investigation moved to the
stage of judicial and administrative accountability, with the referral of the
accused to the judiciary and dismissal of nine officials from their positions,
pending what subsequent legal procedures will reveal regarding the extent of
involvement and responsibilities in the case.
Explosive Device Blast Shakes Jaramana in Damascus Countryside.. Here Are the
Details
Janoubia/November 14, 2026
Two people were killed and two others injured, according to a preliminary toll,
as a result of an explosive device exploding inside a car in the city of
Jaramana in Damascus countryside, today Saturday, in an incident that revived
fears of repeated bombings in the vicinity of the Syrian capital, amid a
security alert in the area. Syrian media quoted Internal Security as saying that
an explosive device exploded inside a car in the city of Jaramana, noting that
the explosion occurred in the vicinity of Al-Nasim Corniche, near Al-Suwayda
Garage. Local media reported two dead and two wounded as a result of the
explosion, in a preliminary toll, without final information available about the
identities of the victims or the nature of injuries, while the party responsible
for the bombing has not yet been announced. The explosion comes amid a series of
security incidents witnessed by Jaramana and the vicinity of Damascus in recent
months, as the city had previously witnessed, on August 6, 2026, an explosive
device exploding inside a passenger transport bus, which led to civilian deaths
and injuries. Jaramana also witnessed, in July 2026, a security incident at one
of its entrances, resulting in the death of one person and injury of three
Internal Security personnel, following a clash that occurred during an attempt
to verify the identity of two people riding a motorcycle. Security incidents in
Jaramana gain special importance, given the city's location in Damascus
countryside and its diverse population nature, in addition to the tensions it
witnessed during April 2025, when clashes of a sectarian nature broke out
resulting in dozens of deaths. These developments bring back to light the
security situation in the city and the vicinity of the Syrian capital, amid
anticipation of what investigations will reveal about the circumstances of the
latest explosion and the parties behind it.
French Police Detain More Than 200 People During Saturday Protests ... Situation
Remained Generally Under Control
Riyadh: Al Arabiya.net and agencies/November 14, 2026
French police detained 219 people during protests that took place today,
Saturday, denouncing the rising cost of living and demanding improved education,
according to the Ministry of Interior. Incidents were recorded in several
cities, including Marseille, Grenoble, and Lyon, where protesters set fire to
garbage containers and threw objects toward police officers. The Ministry said
the situation remained generally under control. About 106,000 people
demonstrated across the country, while 24,000 people gathered in the streets of
Paris alone. Total protest events were 137, according to official data, while
organizers estimated the number of demonstrators at about 200,000 people. The
Ministry explained that the number of participants in today's protests was less
compared to last weekend, which saw the participation of 146,000 people across
the country. The second largest economy in the European Union faces protests
from diverse social segments for more than a month, most notably movements of
high school students and protest against the high cost of living, ahead of
presidential elections scheduled for April. In the demonstrations organized for
the fifth consecutive Saturday, protesters in Place de la République in Paris on
Saturday afternoon chanted slogans including "No peace without justice." Others
demanded the resignation of President Emmanuel Macron, and chanted "Everyone
hates the police."The demonstrations in recent weeks have been generally
peaceful, but interspersed with riots and looting. Protesters accused police of
using excessive violence. The "Yellow Vests" movement joined high school
students, unions, and other activists defending children's rights or opposing a
bill granting police greater protection when using weapons.
Movement member Benjamin Paul said amid thousands of demonstrators in Paris,
including students, unionists, and human rights activists, "The government has
given us only crumbs, and we want the whole bakery."As for Adrian, a
twenty-year-old cellist who came with a volunteer orchestra, he said he is
protesting against a new bill that gives police officers who use their weapons a
legal presumption that they were in a state of legitimate self-defense. He
added: "We feel afraid when we come to the protest, and this will only increase
our fear if their impunity is strengthened," after police fired tear gas at a
similar group of protesting musicians last month. Supporters of the bill,
including the far-right National Rally party led by presidential candidate
Marine Le Pen, say it is necessary to avoid automatically suspecting police of
using excessive force. But opponents of the text, which was approved by the
National Assembly and will soon be presented to the Senate, see it as amounting
to a "license to kill," and will make holding law enforcement forces accountable
extremely difficult. Unions called for a new strike on Tuesday, after rejecting
the government's pledge to raise the minimum wage by 0.6 percent, considering it
mere "crumbs."
The Latest English LCCC analysis &
editorials from miscellaneous sources published
on November
14-15/2026 /
(Some of the News reports below are
translated from Arabic by AI)
The Gulf Is a Partner in the
Settlement
Mohammed al-Rumaihi/Asharq Al-Awsat/November 14/2026
No one can say with certainty whether war or peace lies ahead between the US and
Iran, but what is certain is that both have been exhausted by the conflict. The
Gulf countries had no say in the outbreak of the war, yet they have paid a heavy
price for it. If there is to be peace, it is unacceptable for the Gulf to be
sidelined after bearing that cost. That is the starting point for reading the
current efforts to end a confrontation suspended between neither war nor peace.
The Gulf states hold a direct stake in shaping any eventual settlement, and
their participation is a prerequisite for an agreement meant to last. The cost
to the Gulf is not confined to a struck facility or a disabled ship. In the
Strait of Hormuz, energy and trade flows are disrupted, shipping and insurance
risks escalate, and delivery schedules grow increasingly uncertain. In Bab
al-Mandeb, the Houthi threat to navigation forces vessels onto longer routes,
driving up transport costs and delaying supplies. Caught between these two
straits, regional economies, which rely on uninterrupted trade to sustain
projects and ensure domestic jobs and stability, are suffering.
The Gulf position calling for de-escalation therefore stems from an
understanding of national interest. The Gulf countries have built their plans on
economic diversification, attracting investment, and opening the door to work
for millions of non-citizens. The continuation of the conflict consumes some of
what was set aside for these goals. They need a neighborhood that can be dealt
with according to clear international rules, and clarity is the last thing one
can expect from Iran, as we are seeing and experiencing.
This is what gives value to the mediation led by Qatar and supported by Saudi
Arabia and the other Gulf countries. Doha has continued to exchange proposals
and narrow the gap between Washington and Tehran, and Prince Khalid bin Salman
went to Tehran, despite the escalation against Saudi Arabia, in pursuit of some
rational understanding. The Gulf foreign ministers have affirmed that the effort
is being conducted in coordination with regional partners. With all these
efforts, the observer wakes up holding one view and goes to sleep holding the
opposite.
Saudi Arabia's contacts with the parties concerned and its continued dialogue
with Iran thus keep it present in the search for a way out. Riyadh has a
political and economic weight that any viable future regional arrangement will
need. The multiplicity of Gulf channels of communication can help the
negotiations, provided it rests on agreement over objectives and a distribution
of roles that prevents differences among the capitals from being exploited.
Whatever the situation, the Gulf mediator must not lose sight of its own
interests because it carries the two sides' messages. It must work for a
settlement that safeguards those interests, founded on freedom of navigation and
the protection of civilian facilities. An agreement that addresses one aspect of
the nuclear file is not enough while the threats to the sea lanes and the armed
ideological groups loyal to Iran continue to undermine regional security. Any
agreement might halt one round of fighting while leaving the causes of the next
in place.
The mediation coincides with signs that the Ukrainian-Russian settlement may be
set in motion. Talks were held last weekend in Abu Dhabi, the UAE capital,
bringing together Russia, Ukraine, the United States, and several European
states. No white smoke emerged when they ended, and the ongoing fighting
warrants caution: proximity to negotiations does not equate to proximity to
peace. Disputes over territory and security guarantees remain major obstacles to
reaching an understanding in this prolonged conflict.
If the Ukrainian track advances, the priorities of the great powers may shift,
expanding their capacity to address other pressing files, Iran among them.
Washington and Moscow could find mutual interest in understandings that ease
tensions beyond Europe. While this possibility is worth weighing, it should not
be mistaken for a grand bargain that settles the fate of every region. For the
Gulf, the lesson is clear: present its demands early, before understandings
solidify that will be difficult to amend later.
In Israel, the choice of Gadi Eisenkot to attempt to form a government opens the
possibility of a change of leadership, but it does not guarantee a radical
change of policy. Coalition calculations, party positions, and the effect of the
war on Israeli society, which has deepened its intolerance, shape the room for
maneuver available to any Israeli government. Hopes should not be pinned solely
on one leader departing and another taking over, nor should the opportunity a
political shift might offer to alter the calculus of escalation be overlooked.
The Gulf yardstick must remain tied to tangible conduct: we must wait and see
whether a serious track opens for Palestinian rights. The region cannot achieve
stability while Palestinians remain excluded from any political horizon. The
Gulf participation needed here does not mean granting anyone the right to
determine another state's future, but rather entrenching the right of the
region's countries to their own security and sovereignty.
Iran must understand that reassuring its neighbors requires practical
commitments, and Washington must understand that its agreement with Tehran is no
substitute for consulting its partners. The Gulf countries have a clear view of
what they accept and what they reject, and their future economic cooperation is
tied to conduct that respects those commitments. A unified Gulf position has now
taken shape - one that defines its security and economic demands and seeks to
translate its mediation efforts into a meaningful role in shaping the
arrangements to come.
Any settlement must include concrete mechanisms for verification and addressing
violations, rather than vague pledges that are difficult to test. Having borne a
heavy share of the cost and actively contributed to the search for a solution,
the Gulf has the right to be a full partner in defining the conditions for
stability and to ensure its interests are factored into any eventual agreement.
Last word: those who bear the cost of a conflict have a share in shaping its
end.
The Crisis of Modern Man… When Instinct Prevails Over
Values
Mustafa al-Kadhimi-Former Iraqi Prime Minister/Asharq Al-Awsat/November 14/2026
The world is undergoing a silent, but profoundly dangerous transformation, one
that reaches beyond the balance of power and politics to the deepest wellsprings
of human behavior. After centuries in which civilizations sought to subordinate
instinct to the authority of reason, morality, and law, we are witnessing a
troubling reversal: the retreat of moral frames of reference and the advance of
naked instinct, with its drives toward domination, vengeance, exclusion, and
fear of the other, even when it conceals itself behind attractive slogans in
political discourse and the media.
Human societies have always known conflict. Yet, civilization rested on a
fundamental premise: that progress is measured by humanity's capacity to
discipline its desires and to subject its power to standards that transcend its
immediate interests. Even in the most turbulent eras, the dichotomies of right
and wrong, justice and injustice, freedom and tyranny formed a normative ceiling
that the powerful were compelled to respect, or at least to hide behind. Today,
instinct has moved from a hidden impulse within the human psyche to an avowed
logic that guides decisions and policies, individual and collective alike. The
paradox is that this moral retreat coincides with the zenith of the scientific
and digital revolution, as if the more the instruments of human power swell, the
narrower the human horizon becomes.
In the realm of technology and artificial intelligence, the question of
"capacity" takes precedence over the measure of "responsibility": we ask "Can we
do it?" before we ask "Should we?" In certain distorted expressions of
individual liberty, freedom is severed from meaning and obligation, until a
passing desire becomes an absolute right beyond discussion. Even religion, which
came to raise humanity above its selfishness, is at times invoked, once emptied
of its moral and spiritual essence, to lend fanaticism and domination a mantle
of sanctity.
Herein lies the root of the crisis. Instinct is not evil in itself, nor are
freedom or technology dangerous in themselves. The danger lies in desire's
transformation from a human impulse in need of guidance into an authority that
demands that values themselves submit to it.
The wars raging in our region perhaps reveal the harshest face of this
transformation. A confrontation may begin in defense of a legitimate right or in
resistance to injustice, but once it loses its moral restraints, it slides into
a space for the gratification of anger and revenge. Inflicting pain on the other
becomes an aim that outranks the achievement of justice or the ending of the
conflict, and the suffering of civilians is reduced to cold figures within
political and military calculations.
This description does not equate aggressor and victim, nor does it deny peoples
the right to defend their existence. It means that the justice of a cause does
not absolve its champions of moral responsibility for the means they employ, and
that human dignity is a constant value that must not change with a person's
identity or affiliation. More dangerous still, these instincts are no longer
individual. They have become collective instincts, feeding on fear, wounded
memory, and political and media propaganda, and finding in modern technology
vast platforms for incitement and the spread of hatred. The most advanced tools
of the age are thus enlisted in the service of humanity's most primitive
impulses.
The repercussions of this course do not stop at the frontlines; they reach deep
into the social fabric. When instinct prevails over morality, dialogue grows
fragile before passion and tolerance weak before narrow tribalisms, while daily
exposure to scenes of killing and destruction erodes sensitivity to human pain,
especially among the young. As fear and violence persist, society becomes more
willing to justify cruelty, and power gradually shifts from an instrument for
protecting right into the standard by which right is defined.
Yet, the heart of our present predicament is that the conflicts of our world are
no longer genuine conflicts of values so much as conflicts of interest presented
as competing "points of view." Amid this relativism, people can no longer appeal
to any fixed moral or human reference. Everyone is driven, almost by force,
toward militarization and alignment, where right and wrong are determined by
one's position in the trench rather than by the substance of the position
itself. What makes this alignment more dangerous still is that what moves it at
bottom is neither reason nor even calculated interest, but instinct, which has
become capable of deploying both "good" and "evil" to justify its appetite for
domination. The real challenge facing our world today, therefore, lies not in
developing ever more instruments of power, but in subordinating power once again
to reason and morality, freedom to responsibility, and politics to human
dignity. Civilization is measured not only by what humanity is able to do, but
by what it refrains from doing despite being able to. Should humanity lose this
capacity for moral restraint, it will lose not only its struggle with the other,
but its struggle with itself.
Syria’s Support to Yemen and Saudi Arabia
Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al-Awsat/November 14/2026
Should Syrians choose to support Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the rest of the Gulf,
it would come as no surprise. For years, Iran has waged its wars alongside
Lebanese, Iraqi, Afghan, and Pakistani groups. For years, it has operated
directly in Yemen through Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commanders
and advisors, recruiting foreign fighters who are currently battling alongside
the Houthis across the country. Alongside Iran's multinational army, Tehran's
strategy is based on controlling the corners of the region and subjugating its
states. Mohsen Rezaei, Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council,
wrote last week that everyone must accept Iran's project and its seven-point
plan, which secures Tehran's hegemony over what he termed "West Asia", spanning
from the southern Red Sea to the northeastern Mediterranean.
Even if his threats are part of psychological and propaganda warfare,
controlling Yemen and Iraq remains at the core of its strategy to expand its
regional hegemony in a way that threatens its entire neighborhood. From this
perspective, the war in Yemen can be read as a regional conflict rather than an
intra-Yemeni one. All of Iran's wars over the past three decades have been part
of an interconnected project, managed through Afghan, Pakistani, and Iraqi
proxies that fought on its behalf in Syria and Iraq, and are now doing so in
Yemen.
Addressing the issue of Syrian support, Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani said
that should his country decide to deploy troops beyond its borders, it would not
do so in secret.
We know the priorities of the Syrian state: stabilizing the country,
strengthening its security, and fortifying it against external threats. Syrians,
who have sought to reconcile with the Iranian regime and turn a new page since
the very first day following the ouster of Bashar al-Assad's regime, are well
aware of Tehran's animosity toward them.
Tehran has yet to recover from the shock of the Assad regime's collapse - a
regime it spent ten years investing in to prop up, dedicating every resource at
its disposal and standing alongside it against the world to take part in
massacres and destruction unprecedented in the region. The fall of the Assad
regime was entirely unexpected; it was a cornerstone of Iran's regional
strategy, and following its collapse, Tehran's client states have been left
hanging in the balance.
In the coming period, Iran is expected to seek to encircle Syria and weaken
Damascus in an effort to regain a foothold in the eastern Mediterranean, from
which it has been completely cut off. By losing Damascus, Tehran also lost
Beirut, leaving it with the weaker hand in the regional balance of power against
Tel Aviv and Ankara. This is why Iran's wide-ranging attacks west of the Gulf,
which targeted eight countries, are not an Iranian-American or Israeli war as
the conflict originally began. In practice, by refraining from striking Israel
and the United States in retaliation for their overt and covert operations,
Tehran is yielding to the new reality, yet it seeks to compensate for its losses
by regionalizing the conflict toward the Gulf states, Iraq, Yemen, and beyond.
Understanding the nature and evolution of Iranian thinking - and confronting it
- requires broad regional cooperation to halt this new project. Iran, which no
one thought would surrender to defeat in Lebanon, has effectively done so. It
has done nothing beyond attempting to smuggle a few million dollars through a
network of cash-carrying passengers to cover some of Hezbollah's expenses. Its
defeat by Israel and the destruction of its strongholds in Damascus and Beirut
are forcing it to redraw its regional activities. For Iran, Syria is no longer
east of Israel; rather, Tehran now views it as north and west of Iraq. It will
do everything in its power to weaken the new Syrian regime and reactivate the
terrorist groups it previously succeeded in organizing and managing during the
US occupation of Iraq. As a regional power exhausted by the recent war and
forced to recalculate, Iran recognizes that it is not on par to confront Israel.
Instead, it will target other regional hubs in an effort to restore its
presence, rebuild its capabilities, and cultivate proxies and leverage with
which to bargain with the West, as well as China. Iran's shift away from
confronting Israel, which it had long considered its regional rival, appears to
be an increasingly tangible new reality day by day. This makes regional
cooperation to counter the new threat an imperative for ensuring the region's
security and establishing a balance of power that compels Tehran to abandon the
policy of expansion and aggression it has pursued since the founding of the
republic.
The US Elections… A Test of Cognitive Immunity
Dr. Abdullah Faisal Alrabeh/Asharq Al-Awsat/November 14/2026
Having set out the concept of cognitive immunity and examined the psychology of
emotional consumption, it is now worth testing these ideas against real events,
to see how far they shape public awareness. US elections are among the clearest
of these tests. They attract wide international attention and a flood of
forecasts and analyses, not all of which rest on a methodical reading of the
electoral landscape. In this landscape, political data sometimes intertwines
with preconceived stances, causing efforts to understand voter trends to recede
in favor of the desire to see specific outcomes.
One manifestation of weak cognitive immunity is projecting political aspirations
onto the ballot box. Some commentators do not read the trajectory of US
elections based on domestic American dynamics, voter orientations, and
state-level balances, so much as they do based on their own stances toward the
candidates and what they wish to see for Middle Eastern issues.
As a result, analysis shifts from an attempt to explain electoral behavior to a
moral evaluation of the candidates, as if an analyst's rejection of a candidate
serves as evidence of that candidate's declining chances of winning. Here, a
confusion occurs between one's personal stance toward a candidate and an
objective reading of their electoral prospects; the former expresses the
conviction - or inclination - of its holder, whereas the latter requires
different tools and testable data.
This flaw is not limited to stances and impressions, but extends to how numbers
and opinion polls are utilized. Some commentators resort to cherry-picking
indicators or percentages that align with their preconceived conclusions without
placing them within their broader statistical and political context. This issue
becomes particularly critical when reading US elections; the popular vote,
despite its importance in gauging the general mood, is not sufficient on its own
to determine the winner of the office, given the Electoral College system and
the decisive role played by swing states.
Consequently, treating a single poll or an isolated percentage as conclusive
evidence of the outcome's direction ignores the nature and complexities of the
electoral system, giving the audience an impression of precision that the data
does not necessarily support.
This exposes a fundamental difference between analysis rooted in specialized
knowledge of domestic US affairs and a reading based on impressions or
ideological stances. Understanding voter trends requires examining a set of
interrelated factors, including economic performance, demographic shifts,
working-class priorities, turnout levels, and the nature of competition in
decisive states. These factors cannot be reduced to a candidate's stance on a
foreign issue, regardless of its importance to observers outside the US. The
priorities governing the American voter's ballot may differ from those from
which an Arab or regional commentator evaluates the candidates.
Therefore, the importance of activating the authority of critical questioning
among the audience emerges, not as a stance against the analyst or a questioning
of their intentions, but as a tool to test their methodology. The fundamental
question is not whether the analysis aligns with our convictions, but rather
whether it is grounded in genuine knowledge of domestic US affairs, understands
the nature of the electoral system, and offers a balanced reading of the
available data. A distinction must also be drawn between methodical assessment
based on verifiable indicators and wishful thinking that presents personal
preferences as objective conclusions.
Ultimately, the problem does not lie in an observer holding a political stance
or a preference for a particular candidate, but rather in that stance becoming
the criterion for reading and interpreting reality. US elections, much like
major international events, are not an arena for projecting wishes; rather, they
are a test of the ability of both the analyst and the audience to separate
desire from fact, and value judgments from political assessment.
This is where cognitive immunity begins: reading results and indicators as they
are, not as we wish them to be, and recognizing that understanding shifts within
major powers requires a precise knowledge of their societies and institutions,
rather than merely following the clamor of television screens or echoing
forecasts that align with our preconceived views.
Spinning in the Same Circle... No Serious Breakthrough
on the Moscow-Kyiv Track
Laura Yammine/Al-Markazia/November 14, 2026
(Translated by AI from Arabic)
Al-Markazia – Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Moscow on Thursday with
U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Russian presidential aide Yuri
Ushakov stated that Witkoff and Kushner endorsed Putin's proposal to expand the
successful humanitarian mission pilot in Alyoshki to include Konstantinovka. He
noted that the Russian President and the U.S. envoys discussed an initiative for
the largest prisoner exchange between Russia and Ukraine, the terms of which are
currently being finalized. Ushakov announced that Witkoff and Kushner provided
detailed assessments of the Abu Dhabi negotiations, and that Russia hopes the
two envoys will convey Moscow's messages to the Europeans and Ukrainians in
Dublin. He pointed out that Putin affirmed to Witkoff and Kushner that the Trump
administration is "working continuously to achieve long-term peace" in Ukraine.
For his part, Witkoff announced that "progress was made" following the talks
with the Russian President in Moscow, declaring an agreement to hold a new round
of trilateral negotiations between Russia, the United States, and Ukraine, and
adding that the Europeans will participate in the upcoming talks. In turn,
Kushner confirmed that the discussions with the Russian President were
"intensive and detailed." The U.S. envoys' tour concluded with a meeting with
European and Ukrainian leaders in Dublin on Friday. Diplomatic sources tell "Al-Markazia"
that U.S. activity on the Russian-Ukrainian conflict settlement track is
intensive—having moved this week between Abu Dhabi, Moscow, and Dublin—but so
far, it has yielded virtually no results. It has produced nothing beyond work
toward completing a broad prisoner swap between Moscow and Kyiv, described as
potentially the largest of its kind since the outbreak of the conflict.
Conversely, the points of contention remain unchanged: Putin clings to his
demands regarding control over the four regions Moscow announced it had annexed,
and rejects the idea of deploying foreign peacekeeping forces in Ukraine,
considering them legitimate targets for Russian forces. Meanwhile, Kyiv insists
on strict security guarantees and the protection of its sovereignty. Parallel to
this inflexibility, mutual drone and missile attacks continue between the two
sides. In light of all this, it can be said that the U.S. effort is going around
in a vicious circle and no major breakthrough is expected in the foreseeable
future. However, the mere resumption of negotiations between the warring parties
and the inclusion of Europeans in these talks is considered a breakthrough in
itself, for which Washington can congratulate itself!
What is the Future of Islamist Movements in the Arab
World?
Dr. Abdullah Juma Al-Hajj/ Al-Ittihad/November
14, 2026
(Translated by AI from Arabic)
We, as Arabs, have witnessed much of the hatred, animosity, and lack of respect
displayed by members of Islamist movements toward anyone holding ideas that do
not align or agree with theirs. It has become clear that these movements are
mobilized and charged against anyone who holds a balanced, moderate mindset,
operating from a strong conviction that they and those who share their ideology
are in the right, while everyone else is in the wrong.
In this context, their adherents present themselves as wishing to serve the
public good, yet they do so according to dreamy, utopian visions far removed
from their own reality, their societies, and actual living conditions. Here, an
approach of "political cynicism"—characterized by a loss of faith in moral
values and institutions—becomes evident. This political cynicism, cloaked in
excessive religiosity and outward displays of asceticism and righteousness that
cannot genuinely exist in the daily lives of ordinary human beings, is deeply
rooted, perhaps unjustifiably so; anyone who does not belong to the group is
harshly classified as outside the faith. Members of Islamist movements usually
claim that they stand firmly for their will and mission in life to place
principles above individuals, yet the reality, practices, and ideas they exhibit
neither confirm nor validate the rhetoric they preach.
Broad aspects of their agendas are things the public does not wish to see
implemented in any Arab or Muslim country. While we, as Arab Muslims, have seen
waves of recruits to these movements—and those who call themselves
"Islamists"—pass through our lives since the 1960s, carrying ideas and behaviors
that provoke interest and attract attention, millions of Arabs and Muslims do
not share their political ideas regarding the governance of state and society.
On a personal level, I have engaged in numerous intellectual discussions with
many leaders of these groups hailing from various Arab and Islamic
nationalities, both male and female. These discussions covered many
intellectual, political, cultural, and religious aspects of life related to the
state, society, and the relationship between religion and politics; however, I
ultimately discovered that I disagree with them on a great many of these
matters.
What we believe is that rational, wise political systems in the Arab
world—according to each Arab citizen's own interpretive understanding of what
constitutes "rational and wise"—should be capable of absorbing and containing
the challenges emanating from these movements, and immunizing societies against
the risks that may result from them. Such rational, wise political systems might
possess the ability to steer the helm of these movements toward directions
beneficial to their societies. Regarding the waves of demonstrations that swept
a number of Arab countries—which Westerners termed the "Arab Spring"—some
believed they would offer something in that direction. However, the exact
opposite occurred in terms of increased instability and chaos that engulfed the
countries concerned, pushing political possibilities toward trajectories that
remain ambiguous. In truth, even the desire to explore these ambiguous
possibilities and where future events will lead requires us first to take the
pulse of what has become of the Islamist movements themselves: What have they
turned into? What do they revolve around? And will they survive their current
predicament, especially since most circumstances are working against them? We
conclude from this that the fate and future of most, if not all, of these
movements are uncertain, and many of their leaders are either pursued and living
as refugees outside the lands of the Arab world, or they and their followers
have gone underground and are operating in secret.
Washington and Iran: Diplomacy Under Siege
Hoda Raouf/Independent Arabia/
November 14, 2026
(Translated by AI from Arabic)
The fundamental dilemma between Washington and Tehran is no longer about the
United States' ability to inflict further damage on Iran, but rather its ability
to translate economic and military pressure into political concessions without
pushing Iran toward a new escalation that might drag the region back into a
wider war. Following the conclusion of the U.S. midterm elections, the prospects
of a military confrontation between the United States and Iran have returned to
the forefront of debate, amid questions over whether President Donald Trump will
move to resume military operations or continue the policy of naval blockade and
economic pressure to force Tehran to make concessions.However, recent
developments indicate that both sides face a strategic impasse far more complex
than a mere choice between war and negotiation. The United States has succeeded
in imposing painful economic pressures on Iran, yet it has so far failed to
convert them into Iranian acceptance of its terms. Conversely, Tehran has
managed to hold out and retain its capacity to threaten U.S. interests and
navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, yet it has been unable to break the blockade
or restore normal oil flows. Thus, both parties possess the tools to hurt one
another, without either possessing a guaranteed means to impose a settlement on
its own terms.
The Economic Blockade: Tactical Success and Strategic Impasse
The U.S. administration is betting that the continuation of the naval blockade
and the drying up of Iranian financial resources will gradually alter the
political calculations of the Iranian regime. From an economic standpoint, the
effectiveness of this strategy cannot be understated; the blockade has curtailed
Iran's ability to export oil and deepened pressures on an economy already
suffering from structural imbalances and prolonged sanctions.
Yet the problem lies in the U.S. assumption that increasing the economic
cost will inevitably lead to political capitulation, which is far from
guaranteed. Economic pressure and the naval blockade could push Iran toward
military provocations—such as targeting oil tankers or spurring the Houthis to
launch further attacks against Saudi Arabia—in order to compel Trump to accept
negotiations with it. The Iranian regime does not view
this confrontation as an economic dispute resolvable through profit-and-loss
calculations alone, but rather as a test of its survival, credibility, and
deterrence capability. Consequently, making concessions that are interpreted
domestically as submission to U.S. pressure may, in the calculations of the
Iranian leadership, represent a political threat outweighing the cost of a
continued blockade. This does not mean that Iran is immune to economic pressures
or can endure them indefinitely; rather, it means that pressure may push it
toward negotiating flexibility without necessarily pushing it to accept core
U.S. demands. Indeed, continuing the blockade without a clear political horizon
could produce the opposite result, should Tehran conclude that limited military
escalation has become less costly than open-ended economic attrition.
Why Might Iran Initiate Escalation?
One potential miscalculation in U.S. assessments is treating Iran's restraint
from all-out escalation as guaranteed behavior. Throughout various stages of the
confrontation, Tehran has demonstrated a willingness to use maritime threats and
indirect strikes to alter its adversaries' calculations. This approach relies on
attempting to shift part of the cost of U.S. pressure onto regional and
international actors, particularly countries dependent on the stability of
energy markets and freedom of navigation. Here, the strategic importance of the
Strait of Hormuz comes into play: Iran does not need to impose full naval
control over it to impact global trade. Maintaining the ability to threaten
vessels and drive up security risks alongside insurance and shipping costs is
sufficient to transform the crisis from a U.S.-Iranian standoff into an
international economic and security crisis. Nevertheless, this strategy carries
high risks, as Iranian escalation could push Washington toward a broader
military response, even if it were not originally inclined to resume the war.
Thus, a dangerous equation takes shape: the United States believes continuing
the blockade will force Iran to back down, while Iran believes raising the cost
of the blockade for others will force Washington to negotiate—with each side
betting that the other will blink first. Meanwhile, as
diplomacy stirs, the dispute over the sequencing of concessions persists.
Parallel to this potential escalation, recent days have witnessed renewed
diplomatic efforts mediated by Qatar and Pakistan, alongside the circulation of
an Iranian proposal based on the possibility of moving toward an understanding
within two days. The circulating proposals center on lifting the naval blockade,
releasing frozen Iranian assets, and creating conditions to reopen the Strait of
Hormuz and restore maritime security, leading up to broader arrangements to end
the war. However, the crux of the disagreement
concerns not only the substance of the concessions, but the sequence of their
implementation and guarantees of compliance. Washington wants to secure Iranian
commitments regarding the nuclear program and maritime security before offering
substantial economic relief, whereas Tehran demands lifting the blockade and
providing guarantees to end military operations before making strategic
concessions that would leave it more exposed to any subsequent U.S. attack.
Statements by Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, in response to Marco
Rubio, reflect Tehran's continued rejection of the U.S. logic that economic
pressures can extract concessions from it under coercion. Precisely here lies
the deadlock, as neither side trusts that fulfilling its commitments first will
be met with reciprocal compliance from the other.
A Phased Exit or a New Confrontation?
Phased diplomacy may be the most realistic way out of the current impasse.
Rather than attempting to reach a comprehensive agreement addressing all files
at once, the parties could begin with a mutual, synchronized understanding that
links easing the blockade to restoring safe navigation, before moving on to
nuclear negotiations, lifting sanctions, and releasing frozen assets according
to a clear timetable and guarantees. Yet the success of this path requires a
shift in the political calculations of both sides: Washington must recognize
that the effectiveness of pressure does not necessarily equate to the ability to
achieve all its objectives, while Tehran must recognize that its ability to
endure and inflict damage on its adversaries does not mean it can withstand
economic attrition indefinitely. The greatest danger
today is not that either side has already decided to wage a new war, but that
each continues to pursue a strategy it believes will force the other to retreat,
until both find themselves facing an escalation neither wanted. A blockade may
be an effective tool of pressure, but it is not a complete political strategy;
similarly, Iranian resilience may prevent capitulation, but on its own it
provides no exit from the crisis. Between these two poles remains the decisive
question: Can the two sides convert their instruments of mutual pressure into
incentives for a settlement, or will they continue testing the limits of each
other's endurance until war once again becomes the outcome of failed diplomacy?
While Trump has declared that the United States does not need a deal with Iran
and signaled the continuation of the naval blockade and economic pressure—a
stance suggesting a retreat from the negotiating track pushed by his Vice
President, JD Vance—this development reinforces the notion that Washington does
not necessarily reject diplomacy, but appears more inclined to prolong economic
pressure rather than offer immediate concessions, even as Tehran views the
continuation of the status quo as an unsustainable, open-ended drain.
Selected Face Book & X tweets
on November 14/2026
Gadi Eisenkot - גדי איזנקוט@gadi_eisenkot
The outgoing prime minister’s statement to the media this
evening, in which he called for a meeting to negotiate, is yet another spin
move. After all, Netanyahu knows that such a meeting has already been scheduled.
It has been scheduled for tomorrow between the negotiating teams of Yesh Atid
and Likud.My Israeli brothers and sisters, this is the latest bluff:
Netanyahu calls for negotiations after they have already been scheduled,
claims he wants unity, but disgraces a state ceremony in the Knesset and divides
and incites as if there were no tomorrow.Nice try, but these tricks don’t work
on me. And they don’t work on the citizens of Israel
either.For the avoidance of doubt, Netanyahu also knows that the conditions for
joining an emergency government under my leadership are acceptance of the
principles I have laid out and a break with the extremists. Ultimately, after
all the speeches and statements, the truth remains: Netanyahu knows he lost the
election. He knows there is an overwhelming majority against him among the
citizens of Israel and in the Knesset, and he knows that a new, better
government will be formed. That is why he is fighting a delaying action aimed at
making it difficult to form a new government and thwarting the replacement of
the Knesset speaker. The next test for Likud and Religious Zionism comes this
Tuesday, when elections will be held to appoint the candidate of the parties of
change and reform, MK Matan Kahana. If they are indeed committed to genuine
political partnership, as they claim, they must allow a proper democratic
process to take place on schedule and instruct their Knesset members to support
the appointment of Matan Kahana—a former lieutenant colonel, squadron commander
and Sayeret Matkal commando—as Knesset speaker.
This is their opportunity to prove how serious they are. Or, once again, it will
all be nothing more than an empty political trick. The choice is theirs.I am
working, even at this very moment, to form a national emergency government as
soon as possible. Have a good week, everyone.
Deep Leaks@DeepLeaksHQ
https://x.com/DeepLeaksHQ/status/2121614867962683561/video/1
Islamic scholar Mohammad Nusairat in Chicago drops the mask:
“We did NOT come here to coexist. We are superior to everyone else and will not
be surpassed. No one is above us. If other religions want to live with us, they
have to worship Allah”
יצחק הרצוג Isaac Herzog@Isaac_Herzog
I am shocked and heartbroken over the murder of the late Lina Qassem Zidan, 51,
who was killed today in a grenade explosion when a grenade was thrown at a candy
store in Kafr Manda—a tragic incident in which three other civilians were
injured.
Lina, may she rest in peace, is the 200th woman murdered in Arab society since
the beginning of the year. This is a chilling and unthinkable figure,
illustrating the depth of the crime and violence crisis in Arab society and the
grave danger facing Israeli society as a whole. We must intensify the fight
against this crime. Every government that takes office must act decisively and
immediately against criminal organizations, lawbreakers, and illegal weapons.
Human life is not expendable, and security is the state's fundamental duty to
its citizens. At this difficult time, I wish to extend my condolences to Lina's
family, may she rest in peace, and to all the residents of Kafr Manda, and to
wish the injured a speedy recovery.
Nargis Bano@Nargis_Bano78
Israeli politics has been rocked by a new earthquake,
With Gadi Eisenkot’s affection for Arab parties now drawing pressure from all
sides, another major revelation has emerged that is nothing short of a
nightmare,
Lieberman, of Gadi Eisenkot’s bloc, has made it clear that he will not form a
government with Arab parties. An MP has also opposed the Arab party. Now another
name comes up: Naftali Bennett, a former prime minister of Israel who is also
part of Eisenkot’s bloc,
Bennett believes he will not go with the Arab party, but he does not want to go
with the Haredi party either. My intelligence-trained mind tells me that Bennett
wants another election in Israel so that he can become PM himself, The Haredi
party is part of Netanyahu’s bloc, but it is sulking with Netanyahu. There is
another party, however, that is with Benjamin Netanyahu. The Haredi party United
Torah Judaism has 7 seats. Even if Gadi Eisenkot does not seek the Arab party’s
support and instead gets support from the Haredi party, he will still not have a
majority, while the other Haredi party, Shas, does not want to abandon Benjamin
Netanyahu,
Lieberman thinks that if the Arab party forms an alliance, that alliance will
fall apart and Benjamin Netanyahu will emerge stronger. Lieberman wants Jews to
form the government together, while Bennett does not want an alliance with the
Haredi party either. Now what is poor Gadi Eisenkot supposed to do, Gadi
Eisenkot wants to form an alliance with the Arab party, but some jealous people
do not want Arabs to be respected in Israel. If this tug-of-war continues, there
could be another election in Israel. Perhaps that is what Bennett wants too,
Elie Maimon @Physics_JRSLM
Israel is the first country in the world to have brought in Black people from
Africa to free them rather than enslave them. While most immigrants from
Ethiopia could not read, the next generation now includes doctors, lawyers,
members of parliament, ministers, engineers, supermodels...
The Ethiopian community in Israel has roughly doubled in 40 years.
But Palestinian propaganda, which calls Black people "Abeed" (slaves), swears to
you that Israel invested enormous resources just to bring Ethiopian Jews to
Israel and sterilize them.
Pictured: Pnina Tamano-Shata, born in Ethiopia in 1981. She immigrated to Israel
at the age of 3 as part of Operation Moses. In 2013, she became the first woman
of Ethiopian descent elected to the Knesset, and then became a minister in 2020.
Ayn Reagan
Mamdani is dismantling New York City's ability to deal with terrorist attacks.
El-Sayed is demanding that America must stop protecting those countries that
outlaw the Muslim Brotherhood. These jihadists are
Fox News
https://x.com/FoxNews/status/2121340619444408801/video/1
REPORTER: “Who responds to terrorist threats if the Strategic Response Group is
disbanded?”
MAMDANI: “As I’ve said… I’m committed to disbanding the Strategic Response Group
and that I do not believe that the responsibilities of
אביגדור ליברמן@AvigdorLiberman
Exactly eight years ago, I resigned as defense minister following Netanyahu’s
decision to transfer suitcases of dollars to Hamas to buy quiet. I refused to be
complicit in this policy of surrender, whose terrible price we paid in the
October 7 massacre, even at the cost of giving up one of the most important
positions in the country. Soon we will establish a state commission of inquiry
to thoroughly investigate all the failures and decisions that led to the
massacre and ensure that those responsible are held accountable. And as early as
Monday, when I officially take office as chair of the Foreign Affairs and
Defense Committee, I will act according to the same principles that guided me
then: Israel’s security and the good of the country above all other
considerations 🇮🇱
Khalifa@khalifa_Halabi
https://x.com/khalifa_Halabi/status/2121545570141536314/video/1
I feel sorry for Lebanon, led by a leader who has a quarter of the courage of a
single history lecturer at a university.Dr. Makram Rabah @makramrabah
is fed up with Joseph Aoun, who is turning out to be a typical Arab leader: he
enjoys his trips abroad, enjoys the title “Fakhamat al-Rais” (His Excellency the
President), and speaks polished English with Trump on his visits to the US. Lots
of flair and tons of image, with no substance underneath.
Joseph Aoun is the man who commanded the Lebanese army during the years when
Hezbollah ran rampant and grew stronger unchecked. It is naive to think that he,
of all people, will bring salvation to Lebanon. These are the facts, and the
question is what Israel should do with them. Why is Israel playing along with
this charade as if it believes Aoun, and why is it not using American leverage
to exert real pressure on Beirut? The Lebanese arena is the key to breaking the
Iranian axis: Hezbollah is the jewel in the crown of the “exporting the
revolution” ideology, and Nasrallah was its poster boy. Just as the poster boy
disappeared, this ideology too should and can disappear.
We cannot afford endless wars of attrition, and we will not sit in southern
Lebanon for decades only for some future Ehud Barak to order yet another
unilateral withdrawal. We must not repeat the same patterns and the same
historical mistakes.
U.S. Senior Advisor for Arab and African Affairs
The United States commends Egypt for permanently designating the Muslim
Brotherhood a terrorist entity. Freezing assets and cutting off financing deny
terrorists the resources they need. We stand with Egypt confronting Muslim
Brotherhood violence and destabilization.
Sachin Jose
Sister Mary Rafqa Boulos was born into a Maronite Catholic family in Ohio and
pursued a career in medicine, becoming a pediatrician. She later answered God's
call to religious life and became a Sister of Mercy, combining her vocation as a
religious sister with her medical profession.
Miguel Wiñazki
The president of Iran is a murderer. 40 thousand people executed from his own
country in 48 hours. A mass oppressor and torturer.
Alberto Miguel Fernandez
Aoun’s remarks come amid concerns about the security and future
of Lebanon’s Christian communities, as families face violence, displacement, and
pressure to emigrate."